Welcome to Lifestyle Medicine

By Clive Riddle, May 4, 2018 

The May issue of Circulation includes the research article: Impact of Healthy Lifestyle Factors on Life Expectancies in the US Population, which presented findings from a study that aimed “to estimate the impact of lifestyle factors on premature mortality and life expectancy in the US population.” 

Using data from previous studies they defined five low-risk lifestyle factors

1. never smoking
2. ≥30 min/d of moderate to vigorous physical activity
3. moderate alcohol intake
4. a high diet quality score (upper 40%)

The study “estimated hazard ratios for the association of total lifestyle score (0-5 scale) with mortality,” and used available national public databases to estimate life expectancy by levels of the lifestyle score, examining mortality of 42,167 adults. 

They found the females who adopted all five of these low risk factors would at age 50 live 14.0 more years that those who adopted zero of the five; and that men at age 50 who adopted all five would live 12.2 years longer than those who adopted zero. They “estimated that the life expectancy at age 50 years was 29.0 years for women and 25.5 years for men who adopted zero low-risk lifestyle factors. In contrast, for those who adopted all 5 low-risk factors, we projected a life expectancy at age 50 years of 43.1 years for women and 37.6 years for men.” 

With these findings in mind, let’s stop by the American College of Lifestyle Medicine (ACLM), established several years ago as “the professional medical association for those dedicated to the advancement and clinical practice of Lifestyle Medicine as the foundation of a transformed and sustainable healthcare system.” They tell us that “Lifestyle Medicine involves the use of evidence-based lifestyle therapeutic approaches.” 

ACLM and Blue Shield of California have just announced a collaboration “to provide Lifestyle Medicine continuing medical education and other training tools to the nonprofit health plan’s in-network healthcare providers.” They tell us that “with this new collaboration, Blue Shield becomes the first health plan to offer its in-network healthcare professionals access to discounted ACLM courses, membership, conference registration, board certification review coursework and registration for the American Board of Lifestyle Medicine exam.” 

In November last year, ACLM announced the first physicians and health professionals to be board-certified in the field. They also have developed True Health Initiative (THI), “a coalition of world-renowned health experts committed to cutting through the noise and educating on only the evidence-based, time-honored, proven principles about lifestyle as medicine. The ultimate mission of the THI is to eliminate as much as 80% of all lifestyle-related chronic disease through lifestyle as medicine.”