Incorporating lifestyle interventions to maintain health regain health dates back thousands of years. Certain cultures have always relied on lifestyle habits to stay healthy and fight off disease. Areas of the world with the highest concentrations of centenarians are called Blue Zones. These people credit longevity to adhering to lifestyle pillars. These pillars include strong social connections, daily physical activity and most recently, the therapeutic benefits of food. Lifestyle medicine may seem like a trend; however, its long history and strong scientific evidence demonstrate that it is here to stay.
Lifestyle medicine, as defined by the American College of Lifestyle Medicine, is a medical specialty that uses therapeutic lifestyle interventions as the starting point to treat chronic medical conditions, such as cardiovascular disease, Type 2 diabetes and obesity. Healthcare providers use evidence based, prescriptive lifestyle interventions to include nutrition, physical activity, restorative sleep, stress management, social connection and avoidance of risky substances to address the prevention, risk or treatment of our nations devastating chronic diseases.
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