All Videos for Longevity

Is Vitamin D3 Better Than D2?

Vitamin D3—sourced from sunlight exposure, animal, and plant sources—may be preferable to vitamin D2 sourced from fungi.



Standing Up for Your Health

Prolonged daily sitting is associated with a shorter lifespan, even in those who exercise regularly. Standing and treadmill desks are two potential solutions for office workers.



Cancer-Proofing Mutation

Congenital IGF-1 deficiency can lead to Laron Syndrome (a type of dwarfism); but with such low growth hormone levels, those with the condition have dramatically lower cancer rates. This raises the question of whether one can achieve the best of both worlds—by ensuring adequate IGF-1 levels during childhood, while then suppressing excess growth promotion in adulthood.



IGF-1 as One-Stop Cancer Shop

Insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1) is a natural human growth hormone instrumental in normal growth during childhood, but in adulthood can promote abnormal growth—the proliferation, spread (metastasis), and invasion of cancer.



Uprooting the Leading Causes of Death

Death in America is largely a foodborne illness. Focusing on studies published just over the last year in peer-reviewed scientific medical journals, Dr. Greger offers practical advice on how best to feed ourselves and our families to prevent, treat, and even reverse many of the top 15 killers in the United States.



The Benefits of Caloric Restriction Without the Actual Restricting

One mechanism by which caloric restriction may extend one’s lifespan is by upregulating dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), the most abundant steroid hormone in the human body. DHEA supplements are discouraged, but there may be a natural way to conserve levels as we age.



Americans Are Living Longer but Sicker Lives

Though our life expectancy is improving, our health expectancy is not. In fact we are living fewer years without serious disease and disability.



What Women Should Eat to Live Longer

A competing risks analysis of the Harvard Nurses’ Health Study compares the danger of smoking cigarettes to the danger of animal product consumption (cholesterol), and the benefits of plant foods (fiber) to the benefits of exercise.



Preventing Kidney Failure Through Diet

Given how vascular our kidneys are, it should comes as no surprise that animal protein, animal fat, and cholesterol are associated with declining kidney function (microalbuminurea—loss of protein in the urine), which can be an early warning sign not only for kidney failure, but also for heart disease and a shortened lifespan.



Boosting Immunity Through Diet

Inadequate fruit and vegetable intake may help explain the loss of immune function associated with aging that is linked to an increased risk of dying from pneumonia and influenza.



Red Fish, White Fish; Dark Fish, Atrial Fibrillation

The consumption of dark fish (such as salmon, swordfish, bluefish, mackerel, and sardines) may increase our risk of atrial fibrillation—an irregular heartbeat rhythm associated with stroke, dementia, heart failure, and a shortened lifespan.



Harvard’s Meat & Mortality Studies

Monday, March 12, 2012: The Harvard Health Professionals Follow-up Study and the Harvard Nurses’ Health Study concluded that red meat consumption was associated with living a significantly shorter life—increased cancer mortality, increased heart disease mortality, and increased overall mortality.



Plant-Based Atkins Diet

Harvard study found that men and women eating low carb diets live significantly shorter lives, but what about the “eco-Atkins diet,” a plant-based, low carbohydrate diet?



Resolving the Vitamin D-Bate

Why the current vitamin D recommendations may be too low, other expert recommendations may be too high, and 2000 international units a day may be just right.



The Difficulty of Arriving at a Vitamin D Recommendation

People respond differently to the same level of vitamin D supplementation, making it difficult to formulate one-size-fits-all guidelines.



Vitamin D Supplements May Be Necessary

To reach the circulating (25-hydroxy) vitamin D levels associated with the lowest overall mortality, one may need to take supplements, given data suggesting suboptimal production from sun—even under optimal circumstances.



Vitamin D and Mortality May Be a U-Shaped Curve

Vitamin D deficiency may shorten one’s lifespan, but getting too much vitamin D may also adversely affect longevity.



Is Vitamin D the New Vitamin E?

The Institute of Medicine’s conservative position on vitamin D is understandable, given the history of hyped vitamin supplements (vitamin A, beta carotene, folic acid, vitamin C, vitamin E) that turned out worthless—or worse.



Dietary Guidelines: From Dairies to Berries

The success story in Finland shows that science-based dietary guidelines can save millions of lives.



The Tomato Effect

Why does the medical establishment sometimes ignore highly efficacious therapies, such as plant-based diets, for heart disease prevention and treatment?



China Study on Sudden Cardiac Death

The China-Oxford-Cornell Diet and Health Project directed by T. Colin Campbell and colleagues showed that chronic diseases, such as heart disease, are not inevitable consequences of aging.



Our #1 Killer Can Be Stopped

Dr. Dean Ornish proved decades ago that heart disease could be reversed solely with diet and lifestyle changes.



Resuscitating Medicare

Medicare is now accepting for reimbursement the Dean Ornish Program for Reversing Heart Disease and the Pritikin Program, which, on a personal note, is what inspired me to go into medicine.



Saffron for the Treatment of Alzheimer’s

In a double-blind study, the spice saffron beat out placebo in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease dementia symptoms.



Whose Health Unaffected by Eggs?

A leading stroke expert ruffles a few feathers.



Is One Egg a Day Too Much?

The Harvard Physicians’ Health Study suggests that those eating an egg a day live shorter lives.



Slowing the Growth of Cancer

Researchers discovered a dietary intervention that may slow the progression of cancer.