ALSO FOR YOUNGER ONES: For older adults, a protein-rich diet is important for health.
Older adults need to eat more protein-rich foods when they’re trying to lose weight, dealing with a chronic or acute illness, or facing a hospitalization, according to a growing consensus among scientists.
During these stressful periods, aging bodies process protein less efficiently and need more of it to maintain muscle mass and strength, bone health, and other essential physiological functions.
Even healthy seniors need more protein than when they were younger to help preserve muscle mass, experts suggest. Yet up to one-third of older adults don’t eat an adequate amount due to reduced appetite, dental issues, impaired taste, swallowing problems and limited financial resources. Combined with a tendency to become more sedentary, this puts them at risk of deteriorating muscles, compromised mobility, slower recovery from bouts of illness and the loss of independence.
Recent research suggests that older adults who consume more protein are less likely to lose “functioning”: the ability to dress themselves, get out of bed, walk up a flight of stairs and more. In a 2018 study that followed more than 2,900 seniors over 23 years, researchers found that those who ate the most protein were 30 percent less likely to become functionally impaired than those who ate the least amount.
While not conclusive (older adults who eat more protein may be healthier to begin with), “our work suggests that older adults who consume more protein have better outcomes,” said Paul Jacques, co-author of the study and director of the Nutritional Epidemiology Program at Tufts University’s Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging.
In another study, which was published in 2017 and followed nearly 2,000 older adults over six years, people who consumed the least amount of protein were almost twice as likely to have difficulty walking or climbing steps as those who ate the most, after adjusting for health behaviors, chronic conditions and other factors.
Lifting weights helps, too. It helps a lot. For older (over 40, up to past 90) people a good place to start is The Barbell Prescription, published by Mark Rippetoe and endorsed by Nassim Taleb.
In a semi-related manner, I’ve noticed something. In my late 30s I started to spontaneously grunt when I got up out of a chair. I just assumed that was a natural age-related thing, since my father and grandfather did the same thing. But Helen pointed out a few weeks ago that I’ve stopped, and she was right, I just hadn’t noticed. I think it’s the farmer’s carries I’ve been doing for the last few months, because I was doing heavier squats and deadlifts a couple of years ago and that didn’t do it. I’ve also been doing vacuums to strengthen the transversus abdominis muscles, but I suspect it’s the farmer’s carries — they just make me feel lighter on my feet and more agile in general. Lately I’ve also popped up from sitting on the floor in a way I haven’t done for years, and I’m pretty sure that’s the farmer’s carries.