Better sleep and milder hangovers! Believe it or not, some things DO improve with age

Turning 50 i s when we start to worry about our health declining, according to a recent survey. But it’s not all downhill from now on — there are some things about your body that actually get better as it ages.

Your teeth will be less painful

You sweat less . . .

ThE good news is that you can start wearing light- coloured tops without worrying about tell-tale sweat marks.

When W. Larry Kenney, a professor of physiology and kinesiology at Penn State university i n the u. S., compared perspiration rates of women in their 20s and 30s with those in their 50s and 60s, he found the older women sweated less under the same circumstances.

‘it happens to men, too,’ he says. ‘We activate the same density of sweat glands whatever our age, but, as we get older each simply produces less sweat when body temperature rises.’

On the downside, this can make it harder for us to stay cool in hot temperatures — one reason why the older we get, the more careful we must be in intense heat.

The fall in collagen (a substance that keeps our skin firm) that occurs as we age is thought to be key. not only does this give us wrinkles, it alters the structure of the pores and sweat glands reducing their output.

. . . and have fewer colds

WhiLE children get up to ten colds a year, someone in their 70s may only get one or two.

This may in part be down to mixing with fewer people, but predominantly it is because by this time you’ve probably had around 200 colds in total.

This means you’ve probably met the particular cold virus making younger people around you sick at some point earlier in your life and have antibodies fighting it.

‘Our immune system learns how to deal with more and more viruses each time we have a cold,’ says a spokesman from the Common Cold Centre at Cardiff university.

But a new strain is likely to make you sick. And, as with any respiratory infection, colds can bring more complications as we age.

Hangovers will be less severe

if YOu’VE suffered from sensitive teeth over the years, you might be able to spend your twilight ones eating ice cream without grimacing. Sensitivity is usually the result of receding gums or loss of enamel exposing the tubules of the tooth — these are the tiny holes in soft parts of the tooth under the enamel.

This in turn exposes the nerve deep inside the tooth, which is why cold food and drinks i n particular, can be so painful to eat.

‘But if you look at an X-ray of a 70-yearold tooth and compare it to a 17-yearold’s, you’ll notice that with age the nerve of the tooth shrinks in size, making it harder for this to have an effect,’ says Professor Andrew Eder, specialist in restorative dentistry at the London Tooth Wear Clinic.

‘On average, it’ll shrink by 30 to 40 per cent over the years, but in some people it can almost disappear entirely.’

These changes may be observable on X-rays from your 40s or 50s. Professor Eder adds: ‘On top of this, over time the tubules themselves can actually narrow as they become naturally blocked, making it harder for things to cause discomfort.’

One of the downsides of this is it can be harder to feel damage — such as the formation of cavities — occurring in the tooth. iT MighT not seem it when your head is pounding the day after a bottle of good red wine. But when psychologist Dr richard Stephens at Keele university analysed the statistics, he found people aged 18 to 29 were ten times more likely to experience a hangover after a session of five or more alcoholic drinks than those aged 60 plus were.

Contrary to popular perception that hangovers are worse with age, he says we might build up a biological tolerance to alcohol that slightly lowers hangover risk — though he adds wisdom also helps.

‘With experience, you learn to manage hangovers by drinking less — younger people’s binges tended to contain an average of nine drinks, while older people stopped at an average of six.

‘But natural selection may also play a part — those susceptible to severe hangovers might simply quit binge drinking as they get older.’

hangover headaches may also become less of a problem for some people. The headaches are the result of alcohol damaging the brain, causing it to swell temporarily and crash against the skull. But as we age our brains shrink, so in theory there is more room for it to swell before it hits the bone.

It’s easier to quit smoking

MAnY studies show older smokers are more successful at quitting — in a trial from Canada’s Addiction research foundation, fewer than 20 per cent of 17 to 24-year-olds smoking more than 25 cigarettes a day succeeded at their attempt to quit, while more than 70 per cent of 65-year-olds managed it.

Similar patterns were shown from those smoking fewer than 25 a day. Part of this is likely to be down to having tried to quit before (studies estimate smokers attempt to quit eight to 11 times before succeeding). But it might also be down to the ‘finite future’ concept — as we realise our time is limited, we’re more likely to make sensible decisions about our health.

‘it really is never too late to give up,’ says Amanda Sandford, research manager at Action on Smoking and health.

A study at the radcliffe infirmary, Oxford, found quitting at 50 gives you potentially six more years of life; quitting at 60 adds three years.

You’ll have fewer verrucas . . .

‘ iT’S something chiropodists definitely notice in patients,’ says Michael O’neill of the Society of Chiropodists and Podiatrists.

Verrucas are caused by a virus, and it’s likely your body has encountered the virus before and so mounts less of a response to it, meaning the warts don’t form, he explains.

That’s not the only benefit you can look forward to. The reduction in sweat that affects the armpits also benefits the feet — ‘meaning they don’t smell as much’.

Also toenails grow more slowly as we age, which could be handy if a creaky back stops you bending forward to cut them.

‘Circulation in the feet slows down, which reduces nutrients reaching the nail cells — sadly, it does also make feet a bit colder, too,’ says Mr O’neill.

. . . and allergies won’t be as bad

ThE good news for allergy sufferers is that, as you get older, you probably won’t be so badly affected. researchers at germany’s university of hamburg Eppendorf found levels of the antibody igE that trigger allergic reactions fall as we age, making reactions less likely.

The antibody primes the body to release chemicals such as histamine when they come into contact with the allergen.

however, the study found that people with very high igE levels — probably those with the worst allergies — didn’t experience any drop. it’s not clear why the antibody levels change, but may be part of a slowing of the immune system that occurs with age.

One allergy bucking this trend, though, is hay fever. if you’re in your 50s or over and are wondering why you’re suddenly free of sneezes, be thankful — you might be one of the last generation for a while to see this normal age-related decline.

‘hay fever always used to have a fairly simple pattern,’ says pollen specialist Dr Jean Emberlin, scientific director of Allergy uK.

‘You’d develop it around ten to 15, then it would start to disappear once you reached your 30s. But increasingly we’re seeing this happening less and many people are suffering for life — they’re also developing it in adulthood, too.’

it could be the heavy use of antibiotics in children now reaching their 30s and 40s perhaps altered immune systems, keeping them hypersensitive to pollen for longer.

Fewer migraines — if you’re a woman

A SurVEY on migraine sufferers found 67 per cent of women said that, past menopause, their migraines started to disappear.

‘it’s not surprising as we know hormonal fluctuations can be a trigger f or migraine i n many women — a lot only get migraine just before their menstrual cycle,’ explains Dr fayyaz Ahmed, a neurologist from the Migraine Trust.

‘it’s one of the reasons why two times more women suffer them than men.

‘As oestrogen falls after menopause, though, this trigger is removed from the list of things that can start an attack.

‘if before it was one of a woman’s major triggers, this can mean she doesn’t suffer at all any more. for other women it can mean they don’t reach the threshold as often.’

You’ll sleep better

iT’S often said that sleep declines as we get older, but a recent u.S. study found the opposite.

The researchers asked different age groups about how well they slept and found that, once they’d removed people with obvious health problems, past the age of 59 both men and women said they were sleeping better than ever, with 80-year-olds sleeping best of all.

‘These results contradicted our initial study hypothesis that aging is associated with increased sleep complaints,’ said the researchers. They suggest a number of potential reasons, including less stress with advancing age but also technology: older adults are less likely to use computers late into the night and it’s now known that blue l i ght emitted f rom devices such as smartphones can disturb sleep.

‘Turn these off at least an hour before bed,’ says sleep specialist Dr neil Stanley.