Wednesday, December 21, 2011

THE LOWER THE HEART RATE, THE LONGER THE LIFE.

I have always been intrigue by a table top calender picture given to me earlier, which said that the lower the heart rate, the longer the life. Of course the obvious biological example is the giant Galapagos tortoise which has a resting heart beat of 6 beats per min and an average lifespan of 177 years ( if humans don't kill it ). The mice, on the other hand has a resting heart beat of 240 bpm and a lifespan of 5 years. Interesting. Humans have an average resting heart beat of 60-70bpm and an average lifespan of 70-80 years. Is there any truth in this " 1 billion heart beat per lifespan" theory?
Well, a recent paper by Dr Javaid Nauman of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, published in the 21st Dec issue of the Journal of the American Medical association, entitled, "Temporal changes in resting heart rate and deaths from ischemic heart disease" will help us to understand this a bit better. It is a simple study. Dr Javaid and colleagues studied 13,499 males and 15.826 females who were part of the Nord-Trondelag County Health Study group. He measured their resting heart beats at baseline and again after 10 years of follow-up. The group also tracked their health records over the 10 years to see who died and from what condition. They found that those who had a rising resting heart rate from 70bpm to 85bpms over the 10 years had a 2x increase risk of dying from heart disease. This would somewhat support the " 1 billion heart beat per lifespan theory". However, they also found that trying to lower the resting heart rate artificially, did not seem to prevent the chance of dying from ischemic heat disease, so that high resting heart rate may be a symptom, rather then the disease. A high resting heart rate may be a reflection of our physical and emotional make-up, maybe our lifestyle and our character, something which we cannot easily change with tablets.
For those who have a simple view of life maybe, who know how to take things easy, you will probably live longer ( naturally I mean ), and for those very "kancheong" people, who are forever worrying about this that the other ( maybe the type As), be careful, you maybe worrying yourself to death.
Remember, the giant Galapagos tortoise has a resting heart beat of 6 and live till 177 years. The lower the heart rate, the longer the life.

10 comments:

Unknown said...

Hey sir if we are able to control the speed of heart beat we are able to increase our life span ie sir if we make our heart beat rate tending to zero we can increase our life span to infinity ...

Unknown said...

Bravo Guddu Bhaiya, yes not just infinity but eternal infinity!

Unknown said...

What's new in this theory, Hindu culture has many examples to support this concept.

Unknown said...

If you make your heart beat tending to zero, you will die as the blood will fail to reach your brain in time. Next time before proposing any theory use some common sense if you have studied biology.

Unknown said...

If you believe this crap you'll make it happen...

Ram Kumar said...

In our country many process is available to control our heart beat. Like Yoga. In yoga by pranayama we can control or maintain our heart beat ideally without taking any medicine.

Unknown said...

Yes! For example, just as an engine timing is everything. An demand dictates flow rate. However common sense and practicalities are some times just barriers to getting around things.

anwar1969 said...

According to "1 billion heartbeat in lifespan" theory a person having an average of 60 beats per minute should live only 31 years (neglecting the fact that in early years we have much more heart pumping rate).

Unknown said...

How about atheletes who do alot of exercise? does that has an effect on the life span. is what is considered only the resting heart beat rate?

Bentley Bob said...

I'm firmly believe in "3 billion heart beats a life" - human life span = 80yrs, Average 72 bpm = 3,029,500,000 beats for the life.

So when a runner/jogger/athlete raise's their bpm and on a regular basis - are they shortening their natural life. It would appear so. Some exercise doubles the heart rate - so assuming we raise the bpm from 72 to 100bpm; so doing the maths, 3,029,500,000 beats comes at 57.6yrs

Is this supported by what we see around us. To a certain extent - yes. Who are to oldest people in our society to-day, well mainly women. With far more women aged 85+ then men. Looking back at their lives it is easy and factual to say that very few of these woman went jogging in their youth or middle age. It was not the done thing for women in the 1930's to 1960's or even into the 1970's, to exercise in such a manner. In fact most have done no exercise in their whole lives, other than of course via hard honest hard work and toil.

So, are joggers who follow current medical advice to have an "active" life style running themselves into the grave - it would appear they are.

How many 80+ old, former athletes, male or female, are there alive to-day, compared to the number of inactive females?

The jogger/athlete should look again at why they are potentially shortening their own lives - and for what?