Longevity, sleep banking, and long covid trials: The week in Well+Being

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I think you’ll agree with us on this one. Longevity is not just about living longer, it’s about feeling good as you age — strong in body and mind. If anyone knows about healthy aging, it’s cardiologist Eric Topol, who studied “super agers” for decades. This week, we’re sharing a few things he learned while taking a look at these ultrahealthy older folks. First up? The secret to their success is not all about genetics. With a few lifestyle tweaks, you can dramatically increase your chances of becoming a super ager yourself. But before that …

This week’s must-reads:

• Rough night ahead? Try sleep banking to stay alert.
• Divorce is tricky. What to do if your kids won’t talk to the other parent.
• These 6 exercises, once a week, will make you stronger
• Breathlessness, nausea, a cough and a mass suggested cancer. But was it? Check out this medical mystery.
• How to banish dry skin as you age

How a scientist who studies ‘super agers’ exercises for a longer life

Topol, the cardiologist, spent more than six years sequencing the genomes of about 1,400 people in their 80s or older who had no major chronic diseases. All qualified, he felt, as “super agers.” Turns out they shared few, if any, genetic similarities — meaning their DNA wasn’t necessarily the reason they were faring so well.

There was one lifestyle change that seemed to influence aging far more than any other. It also has altered his own life the most.

Our writer Gretchen Reynolds talked with Topol about how he changed his own lifestyle once he learned from people who are aging well. Plus, he shared the workout that he now does based on his research.

These trials may help long-covid patients

Five years since the pandemic began, millions of people are still grappling with long covid, even as new patients are joining their ranks. But long covid is an umbrella term, and treating it as one disease is, in a way, equivalent to thinking cancer is one entity as opposed to hundreds of types, each with different diagnostics, prognosis and treatments, Ziyad Al-Aly, a clinical epidemiologist at Washington University in St. Louis, told our writer Richard Sima, a former neuroscientist.

That’s why researchers are pressing ahead with new clinical trials for more targeted treatments built on advances in our understanding of long covid. And we’re learning more every day about the condition. “It is a constellation of many things, and dissecting out those things is going to be the biggest challenge,” said Janna Moen, a neuroscientist at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Learn more here about clinical trials that are underway to unravel all the long-covid subtypes and biological pathways that cause this devastating condition.

Why are colorectal cancer rates rising in young adults?

Our Ask a Doctor columnist is Trisha S. Pasricha, a physician at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and an instructor in medicine at Harvard Medical School.

It’s one of the most pressing medical mysteries of our time: Why are so many young people getting colorectal cancer?

Colorectal cancer rates have been declining among U.S. adults over age 50 since the 1980s. But for younger adults, the trend is rapidly going in the wrong direction. While the overall numbers are still relatively low, colorectal cancer will become the leading cause of cancer-related deaths for adults in their 20s, 30s and 40s by 2030. In a study recently published in Nature, scientists unveiled a link between the rise in young colorectal cancers and a toxin called colibactin, which is produced by certain bacteria in the gut. Turns out, 30 to 40 percent of healthy adults have colibactin-producing bacteria, although only a small percentage of people get cancer.

Read more here from Trisha on the one thing you can do to help reduce the impact of colibactin on your digestive tract. And use our Ask a Doctor form to submit a question, and we may answer it in a future column.

Find your joy snack!

Here are a few things that brought us joy this week.

• This man just sits and listens to strangers: ‘You are not alone’
• How the race to invent a drug for one sick baby made medical history
• Powered by potatoes: Endurance athletes are chasing speed with spuds
• The six definitive rules of office lunch etiquette
• Could zeppelins be the future of air travel?
• New atomic clock is one of the world’s best timekeepers

Let’s keep the conversation going. We want to hear from you! Email us at wellbeing@washpost.com.

Want to know more about “joy” snacks? Reporter and former neuroscientist Richard Sima explains what they are and how they can make you feel happier. You can also read his advice as a comic.

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