Dr. Dean Edell: Every eight seconds someone in America rounds the corner and sees the big 5 O's starting them in the face. If you are one of them congratulations, not only because you are in good company but because everyday researches are discovering different ways to keep your golden years golden.
It seems to happen in a flash. One minute you have your whole life ahead of you, the next thing you know the youth has sailed off and you are standing at the threshold of senior citizenship.
Dr. Dean Edell: It’s like going up a hill on a bicycle.
Female Speaker: Get up on the monkey bars anymore.
Female Speaker: My children tell me, I forget everything.
Dr. Dean Edell: 25,000 Americans turn 50 everyday. If you believe getting older resolving your head, you might be right. The solution maybe what you put in your stomach.
Jeff Victoroff: The typical American diet is almost perfectly designed to wreck your brain.
Dr. Dean Edell: Neuropsychiatrist Jeff Victoroff says that high fat food that clog coronary arteries can also affect your brain.
Jeff Victoroff: You are going to decrease blood flow to your brain and you're going to increase your risk for Alzheimers.
Dr. Dean Edell: He says, to eat food high in Omega 3 fatty acid, like Tuna and Salmon. Take Vitamin E and indulging one to three glasses of wine a week.
Jeff Victoroff: Those three changes in and all themselves could probably make a remarkable difference.
Dr. Dean Edell: Brain building exercises can also pump your cognitive ability.
Jeff Victoroff: The world is your brain gym.
Dr. Dean Edell: Neurobiologist Larry Katz says neurobics can keep your aging brain agile, and can be a simple and altering everyday routines.
Larry Katz: The feeling that people get off, wow! This is strange is actually your brain focusing it's attention on a new and a noble task involving a whole different set of sensory inputs.
Dr. Dean Edell: For example, try closing your eyes when you open a door.
Female Speaker: This is like pin the tail on the doggy.
Dr. Dean Edell: Just simply feeling around is activating maps of your world that you have in your brain.
Doris Kelley: I tried to be stimulated in as many was as I can.
Dr. Dean Edell: 72 years old Doris Kelley uses computer exercises to keep her thinking at it's peak.
Sharon Tennstedt: This type of training actually has the potential to reverse age related cognitive decline.
Doris Kelley: I'm challenged by it and a healthy challenge is good.
Dr. Dean Edell: Carole Mason faces a different challenge.
Carole Mason: I have fallen a couple of times in Bergen, my right arm twice.
Dr. Dean Edell: She is one of the 44 million Americans with Osteoporosis and like many she found out by accident.
Karen Prestwood: You don't have any symptoms until you actually break a bone.
Dr. Dean Edell: Carole is taking the parathyroid hormone forteo, which is shown to stimulate bone formation.
Carole Mason: I do wheels and I don't dare do that again, unless they tell me my bones have been rebuilt.
Dr. Dean Edell: Researches are also finding preventive help with other drugs like the blood pressure drug Thiazide.
Andrea LaCroix: it maybe that a medicine you're already going to take to control your high blood pressure will hold your bone density steady enough that you don't need to take other medicines.
Dr. Dean Edell: Non drug therapies like running and walking work to prevent bone loss. Vibration exercise may also help.
Clinton Rubin: What this tries to do is extract lot of exercise what we think is really effective in the skeleton, and what's lost with aging.
Dr. Dean Edell: Bioengineer Clinton Rubin says riding this plate 20 minutes a day can keep bone loss at bay.
Clinton Rubin: You're been treated without drugs therapy than bone disease.
Dr. Dean Edell: Exercise is the huge part of Bob Huskinson's life, so are vitamins and the controversial treatment he takes everyday.
Bob Huskinson: I felt it was good, as I did when I was in my twenties or thirties.
Dr. Dean Edell: Bob takes Human Growth Hormone or HGH. Advocates like Ronald Katz says it can restore vitality.
Ronald Katz: More energy, and more muscle, more bone, more life and what's wrong with those things.
Dr. Dean Edell: Plenty according to Dr. Samuel Epstein who believes use of HGH can increase cancer risk.
Samuel Epstein: They have been misled by unscrupulous and ignorant doctors, whose motivation is financial.
Dr. Dean Edell: Katz disagrees.
Ronald Katz: One day in the not too distant future I think it very well maybe considered malpractice for a doctor to with whole Human Growth Hormone from those people who are clinically deficient.
Dr. Dean Edell: That remains to be seen, but no matter how to try to defend it off some preferred to cherish the wisdom that age brings. Life is just the most wonderful thing and enjoy and love everyday of it. Fifty is no longer over the hill but staying on top may mean combination of diet, drug, and exercise. Your doctor can help you find the best way to keep your golden year sparkle.
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