Rejuvenating patients-one step at a time.
We are watching a vast natural experiment: Take millions of Americans off farms, off manual labor. Give them desk jobs, cars, and televisions. Add sanitation and antibiotics to increase life span. Then sit back and watch what-and how-the people do. You know the results from epidemiologic studies and from your own practice: The average American lives a long time, but he or she is sedentary, fat, unfit-and, often, chronically ill. The worst impact is on the older adults who have accumulated a lifetime of this comfortable but ultimately disabling lifestyle.
Schwenk
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Department of Family Medicine, University of Michigan Medical Center, Ann Arbor, MI, 48109-0326, USA.