We have a birthday once a year, a celebration with some friends and family, and generally curse the fact that we’re another year older. Even worse, every year seems to pass by faster than the one before it, making it feel as though we’re getting older faster, racing towards the end.

The thing is, despite the birthdays and the daunting perception of how fast time flies, we might not be as old as we think we are. That is, the number we assign to ourselves might not match up with what is know as our physiological age. An article in Mens Journal explores just what this is and how it’s measured:

Instead of taking a man’s chronological age at face value, Raffaele uses advanced technology to assess the function of key body systems — cardiovascular, pulmonary, immune, and cognitive among them — and assigns each a “physiological age.” The body’s systems age at different rates. If one gets older faster than it should — and starting in the mid-thirties, the function of the heart, brain, and immune system normally declines around 1 percent a year — it can drag you down a black hole toward life-threatening conditions: diabetes, cancer, heart disease.

It’s now possible to identify which of the body’s systems are going downhill faster, and to tailor a plan to slow that decline and the onset of disease.

As Raffaele puts it, “If you understand how you’re aging, you can slow it down.”

The age of personalized health and fitness plans is well on its way, this is another tool we can use to help us identify where our effort is best placed. Want to how to measure your bodies system? Check out the full post.

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