5 Interventions That May Actually Slow Ageing, And 2 That Seem Not To

You probably already know your chronological age, or how many years you’ve been alive. But researchers are increasingly interested in our so-called “biological age”, which shows the wear…

You probably already know your chronological age, or how many years you’ve been alive. But researchers are increasingly interested in our so-called “biological age”, which shows the wear and tear present in your organs and tissues on a cellular level. A lower biological age has been associated with a lower risk of cancers, cardiovascular diseases, depression, anxiety, all-cause mortality, diabetes, and cognitive impairment.

So it’s a good thing researchers have published a paper on what might actually help to keep our cells “younger”, and what might be a waste of time. Which anti-ageing strategies seem the most and least useful? New research published in Nature Medicine used DNA-based blood tests to see which lifestyle and drug interventions really did seem to slow down “biological ageing”. The scientists combined data from 51 anti-ageing studies with biological information from over 110 DNA biomarkers.

These included 16 “epigenetic clocks”, which estimate people’s biological ages by looking at certain modifiable “tags” on their DNA. Then, the study authors looked at participants’ biological ages before and after four broad interventions: Medications, Supplements, Lifestyle changes, and Medical procedures. “We already know that certain things might prolong health span and lifespan. There is data from retrospective analysis as well as from animal models,” said study author Dr Raghav Sehgal from Yale University.

“We took all that knowledge along with the real-world clinical studies to identify which interventions in humans were slowing down ageing across the board in these known biomarkers”.

Some of the factors that seemed to lower biological age were: A combination of healthy diet and exercise (such as the Mediterranean diet), Prescribed weight-loss medications like semaglutide, Blood control medications like metformin, Anti-TNF therapies, which suppress inflammation in you immune system and are used for conditions like rheumatoid arthtritis and IBD, and Prescription medications “used for metabolic control and weight management”, seemed to slow biological ageing among those who needed them. Anti-TNF therapies stood out as being especially protective against biological ageing.