DR MICHAEL MOSLEY: Have faith… it can help you lead a longer, healthier life

For me, Christmas is a great excuse to get together with friends and family, exchange gifts, and eat and drink too much, but I also love the fact that we sing Christmas carols, go to church, and reflect on God.

I come from a long line of Christian missionaries, some of whom lost their lives in pursuit of their faith, although I must confess that I am an agnostic.

But I do believe that the great religions have a lot to teach us about how to live a good and long life. And there is plenty of scientific evidence to back this up.

For example, in 1999, researchers at the University of Colorado analyzed data collected from 28,000 people as part of the National Health Interview Survey, which has been monitoring the health of Americans since 1957. As part of that survey, they were asked asked participants if they attended any type of religious service and, if so, how often.

It turned out that people who said they went to a church, mosque or synagogue at least once a week lived, on average, seven years longer than those who said they never went.

In a more recent study, published in 2018 with the wonderful title “Does Religion Avoid the Grave?”, Ohio State University researchers tracked the obituaries of more than 1,000 people posted on newspaper websites between August 2010 and August 2018. 2011.

They found that people whose obituaries mentioned having some form of religious affiliation lived an average of 5.64 years longer than those who did not.

Why? Well, we know from research that people, including my 93-year-old mother, who are religious tend to drink and smoke less and generally lead healthier lives.

They are also more likely to volunteer and benefit from belonging to a tight-knit social support group, both of which combat loneliness and reduce the risk of depression.

But according to Dr. Baldwin Way, an associate professor of psychology who helped establish the obituary study, taking those factors into account still doesn’t explain the size of the longevity effect.

He believes the added benefit comes from the fact that “many religions promote stress-reducing practices that can improve health, such as gratitude, prayer, or meditation.”

On top of that, research shows that experiencing a sense of wonder, whether it’s from being in a beautiful place or believing you’re in the presence of God, has a powerful effect on our immune systems.

Experiencing a sense of wonder, believing that you are in the presence of God, has a powerful effect on our immune system.

In 2015, a study of 200 University of California students found that those who reported experiencing positive emotions, such as awe, had lower levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines, proteins that can cause chronic inflammation and, in turn, lead to health problems. such as diabetes and heart disease, in your blood.

It is worth noting that the positive effects of religion seem to depend, in part, on believing in a loving and benevolent deity.

In a startling study of more than 100 HIV patients conducted by the University of Miami in 2011, patients who viewed God as benevolent and forgiving stayed healthier longer and had higher levels of immune cells than those who viewed to God as critic and punisher.

Similarly, studies have shown that people who hold religious beliefs are less likely to develop depression and anxiety, in part because they provide meaning and hope. But when religious beliefs lead to feelings of guilt and failure, this can trigger mental illness.

But what if, like me, you don’t believe in God and rarely go to church?

Well, instead of praying, you might want to try something called “loving-kindness meditation,” where you spend a few minutes each day remembering someone who has been kind to you.

The idea is that you sit quietly somewhere while you meditate quietly and think grateful thoughts about that person.

As Dr. Fuschia Sirois, who researches gratitude at the University of Sheffield, recently told me: “People who express gratitude regularly are more resistant to anxiety and depression, and may even help you cope with chronic pain.”

If meditation doesn’t appeal to you, then you can try ‘Three Good Things’: Put a notebook by your bed and every night for a week, write down three things that went well for you that day.

It can be anything from “I saw a beautiful sunset” to “I had coffee with a friend.” Put in as many details as possible and include how it made you feel. Research shows that this will make you feel better and can improve sleep.

Or you can simply take a walk somewhere green and quiet and take a moment to appreciate the world around you, cultivating a sense of wonder.

A 2020 study, published in the journal Emotion, found that taking a 15-minute “amazing walk” each week helped boost positive emotions and reduce stress. Selfies taken throughout the 12-week experiment also showed that the participants smiled more.

I hope you have a happy and grateful Christmas.

2022: A year of breakthroughs that will transform medicine

2022 has also brought some of the most notable developments in healthcare.

This year has seen world events of such importance that many medical advances have been overshadowed, but 2022 has also brought some remarkable advances in health.

In January, for example, we learned of the first successful pig-to-human heart transplant. David Bennett, 57, had terminal heart disease and received a pig’s heart, genetically modified to be a human match, in an operation in the US.

With thousands of people dying while waiting on a transplant list, I think this is an important development. Sadly, David died two months after the operation, but his courage has shown that this approach can really work.

Then, in February, I wrote about a new device that was being pioneered in Switzerland that was helping paralyzed patients to walk again, with the help of a frame.

The device stimulates nerve cells in the spinal cord, and a few weeks ago, the same Swiss team reported that four out of nine patients implanted with similar devices no longer needed to turn on the walking devices. It seems that just a few months of electrical stimulation had “reset” specific nerve cells and were now working on their own.

This is great news and plans are underway for larger trials in 2023.

It’s also been a good year for vaccine research. A June study, published in The Lancet, found that Covid-19 vaccines had helped prevent nearly 20 million deaths in their first year of use alone.

Perhaps even more extraordinary is that a couple of weeks ago, the pharmaceutical company Moderna announced that a cancer vaccine it had developed, based on the mRNA technology used to create its Covid vaccine, had nearly halved the risk of skin cancer returned in a group of 157 patients.

These were patients who had melanomas (a particularly dangerous form of skin cancer) but were at high risk of developing new tumors because the cancer had already spread. Moderna plans to start a trial with at least 1,000 patients next year.

And while I’m generally skeptical of ‘miracle’ weight-loss drugs, two drugs seem to make a difference, without causing significant side effects.

Semaglutide and tirzepatide mimic the actions of a hormone that is normally produced in our intestines called glucagon-like peptide-1. This hormone makes you feel full after a meal by acting on the appetite centers in the brain and also by slowing down the emptying of the stomach.

In July, a study in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that patients who received weekly injections of tirzepatide for 18 months lost between 15 kg and 20 kg, compared to 3 kg for those who received a placebo injection. And in December, a University of Pittsburgh study using semaglutide in adolescents found similar results.

I’m a big believer in trying to lose weight through dietary changes rather than medication, but this is certainly an impressive breakthrough.

Reason why you don’t like exercise. . .

Exercise stimulates the release of the feel-good hormone, dopamine.

I have friends whose idea of ​​a good time is to go for a five mile run, but I hate running and do it once in a while because I know it’s good for me.

At no time do I feel a runner’s high or feel anything but pain. They have done tests and I hardly release hormones to feel good when I go out for a run.

This is partly down to genetics, but a recent study in the journal Nature suggests that my gut bacteria may also play a role.

American scientists took a group of 106 mice and measured how enthusiastically and how often they voluntarily went for a run on an exercise wheel. They then looked at the composition of their gut microbiomes and found that the keen runners had higher levels of two different types of bacteria, Eubacterium rectale and Coprococcus eutactus.

Research revealed that these microbes produce chemicals known as fatty acid amides, which trigger the release of the feel-good hormone dopamine in their brains while they exercise.

Further studies are planned to see if the same process occurs in humans, in the hope that this may lead to diet-based ways to stimulate these exercise-loving critters and get people, like me, running and enjoying themselves.