Want to Live a Longer, Healthier Life? Your Midlife Fitness Matters

• Recent research has shown that adults with higher levels of midlife cardiorespiratory fitness may live longer, healthier lives.
• The study found that people with higher fitness levels not only lived longer but also developed chronic conditions later than those with lower fitness levels.
• Experts share tips to help improve your cardiorespiratory fitness.

Regular physical activity and fitness levels are important for overall health and well-being.

According to a recent study, your level of cardiorespiratory fitness in midlife can not only help determine how long you live, but also how many of those years you spend in good health.

The study showed that adults with higher midlife cardiorespiratory fitness lived longer, developed fewer chronic diseases, and spent more years free from serious illness than those with lower fitness. The results were recently published in the JACC, the flagship journal of the American College of Cardiology.

“People with higher fitness may also have had other health advantages, such as better diet, less smoking, or more consistent access to care,” said Robert Glatter, MD, attending physician in the Department of Emergency Medicine at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, and assistant professor of emergency medicine at Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell. Glatter wasn’t involved in the study.

“The findings are very much in line with decades of research showing that cardiorespiratory fitness is one of the strongest markers of long-term health,” Glatter told Healthline.

Life span refers to how long you live. Health span refers to how long you live free of any major chronic diseases.

The study results showed that cardiorespiratory fitness can not only affect life span but also health span.

It followed 24,576 adults, 25% of whom were females, from the Cooper Center Longitudinal Study (CCLS). The participants were healthy individuals ages 65 or younger. The researchers later tracked their health outcomes using Medicare data.

Participants’ fitness was measured before age 65 using a treadmill test. During the study, the researchers used Medicare data to identify major chronic diseases for each participant.

They defined major diseases using 11 chronic conditions:

The results showed that males with higher fitness levels had a 2% longer health span, 9% fewer diseases, and a 3% longer life span than those with lower fitness levels. The results showed similar patterns among females.

“This study confirms our understanding of cardiorespiratory fitness as a marker of future health outcomes, and should encourage all of us to make physical activity a part of our daily lives,” Cheng-Han Chen, MD, board certified interventional cardiologist and medical director of the Structural Heart Program at MemorialCare Saddleback Medical Center in Laguna Hills, CA, told Healthline. Chen wasn’t involved in the study.

Mary Greene, MD, a board certified cardiologist with Manhattan Cardiology in NYC, wasn’t involved in the study but noted a “dose-response benefit” in the findings.

“Even modest increases in cardiovascular fitness can lead to a 10–25% improvement in survival,” said Greene.

Still, Glatter said the findings should be interpreted with caution. “The study does not prove cause and effect. It was an observational study, so it cannot prove that higher fitness directly caused the better outcomes,” he said.

The main way to improve your cardiorespiratory fitness is to maintain regular physical activity.

“The encouraging answer is that improvement does not require becoming an athlete,” said Glatter. “For most adults, the target is at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity per week, or 75 minutes of vigorous activity, plus muscle-strengthening exercise at least twice a week.”

• brisk walking
• cycling
• jogging
• swimming
• water aerobics

“A useful rule of thumb is this: during moderate exercise, you can talk but not sing; during vigorous exercise, you can only say a few words before needing a breath,” Glatter said.

Chen agreed. “I would encourage people to do at least 20–30 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity, such as brisk walking, on most days of the week. As their fitness increases, they can then increase either the length or intensity of the exercise,” he said.

Glatter noted that some activity is better than none, and improving fitness at almost any age is a worthwhile investment in both longevity and quality of life.