Looking to age well and dance your way to your 70s and 80s?
Make sure that your bones, joints, muscles are in good shape! Taking steps towards good lifelong musculoskeletal health should be a priority not only during one’s senior years but across the life span including childhood and young adulthood.
Why Prioritize Your Musculoskeletal Health
Millions of people in the US live with the pain, disability, and debilitating impact of poor musculoskeletal health. For example, joint pain affects 1 in 5 Americans and is one of the leading causes of disability in the country.
Pain can be a significant barrier for living satisfying, active lives. Pain from osteoarthritis may make it difficult for a woman in her 30s to exercise while a hip fracture from a fall may make an older person feel alone because of the lack of independence. The burden of poor musculoskeletal health evidently impacts every aspect of one’s personal, intimate, and working lives.
Next, it’s worth noting that social perceptions of getting old are gradually changing. Besides leading active, pain-free lives at present, good musculoskeletal health today enables people to enjoy their later lives and look forward to an active retirement.
The good news is you can take steps towards better musculoskeletal health that is required to carry out daily activities of living without discomfort, remain active in the years ahead, and engage in activities that you’ve always wanted to do.
This guide to promoting lifelong musculoskeletal health brings together an evidence-based approach towards healthy bones, muscles, and joints!
The Importance of Regular Physical Activity
Healthy physical activity improves musculoskeletal health in two ways — reducing risk and preventing further deterioration from musculoskeletal conditions such as back pain, osteoarthritis, and rheumatoid arthritis.
Physical activities such as cycling, walking, running, and swimming are beneficial in reducing the overall risk of musculoskeletal pain, injury, and disability.
For example, a 3-year prospective study in Australia found out that regular physical activity reduces the risk of developing painful osteoarthritis, particularly in middle-aged and older women. Meanwhile, a study in Sweden revealed that engaging in leisure walking regularly has a protective role for hip replacement, especially in women.
For physical activity to reduce further deterioration of painful musculoskeletal conditions, engaging in the right physical activity has been shown to reduce pain intensity, prevent additional disability, and improve the overall quality of life.
Evidence from 7 high-quality studies revealed that guided walking programs are effective interventions in the short-term management of patients with osteoarthritis. Specifically, walking helped improve joint stiffness, muscle strength, overall mobility, and endurance.
On the other hand, resistance exercises have been shown to increase muscle strength resulting in fewer falls as people age. In fact, engaging in leg resistance exercise every other day while on bed rest helps prevent muscle loss.
So you think it’s too late to start?
It turns out that there’s no such thing as too late with physical activities and musculoskeletal health. A 2014 longitudinal research in London reported significant health benefits of regular physical activity even, among men and women who took up physical activity relatively late in life. –
The Role of Nutrition and Supplementation
You’ve probably heard of collagen. For the past decade, it has become a household word, and people outside the health and fitness circle can even recognize its benefits. These include promoting skin elasticity, better digestion, and maintaining the integrity of the skin cartilage which protects the joints. For a quick recap, collagen is the “glue” that holds our body’s tissues together. These include the tendons, muscles, cartilage, and bones.
As the most abundant type of protein in the body, natural collagen stores begin to decrease which may lead to achy joints. Other factors that speed up the natural decline of our body genetics include, smoking, a high sugar diet, excessive alcohol intake, and environmental factors.
How to Add More Collagen In Your Diet
There are two ways to supplement your body’s natural collagens levels – through diet and supplementation.
Bone broth, whether homemade or store-bought, is an excellent source of collagen in the diet. Other food sources that help boost collagen supply are beef, chicken, fish, oysters, citrus, and leafy greens. The meat sources have amino acids that contain collagen. Meanwhile, the zinc and copper in oysters and Vitamin C in leafy greens/citrus help activate collagen synthesis.
Next to regular physical activity and diet, collagen supplementation offers additional advantages if you want to improve your musculoskeletal health and be as active as much as possible as you age. A growing body of evidence reveals that supplemental collagen (collagen hydroxylate) may accumulate in the cartilage and stimulate your body to make its own collagen.
Choosing the Right Collagen Supplement
A good collagen supplement should contain Type 1 collagen if you’re after muscle repair and improving joint health. Besides considering collagen type, you should also look into supplement source, bioavailability ( will it be absorbed well by your body?) and added ingredients like Vitamin C to help with collagen synthesis.
At Hauser Health, our collagen supplement ReGENerate meets all of these criteria. It contains Type 1 collagen as its main ingredient, comes from a sustainable protein source, and has additional ingredients like Vitamin C, hyaluronic acid, and magnesium. All of which are vital for maintaining joint and connective tissue health.
Unlike other higher dose collagen supplements, there is no risk of oxalate kidney stones with ReGENerate. Finally, its patented ingredients are backed by more than fifteen studies in providing joint health support and maintaining the structure of connective tissues despite old age.
Are you planning to add collagen supplements in your diet? Or are you looking for ways to keep your bones and joints healthy as you age?
If you’re in the Maryland area, schedule a consultation with us today, and we’ll help you come up with a personalized plan in aging well.