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Health

Doctor explains how to do a simple physical test that can predict your longevity

People who fail are more likely to die in six years.

via Pexels

A woman sitting cross-legged on a yoga mat

Everyone wants to know how long they will live and there are many indicators that can show whether someone is thriving or on the decline. But people have yet to develop a magic formula to determine exactly how long someone should expect to live.

However, a doctor recently featured on the "Today" show says a straightforward test can reveal the likelihood that someone aged 51 to 80 will die in the near future.

NBC News medical contributor Dr. Natalie Azar was on the "Today" show on March 8 and demonstrated how to perform the simple “sit to stand test” (aka sit-rising test or SRT) that can help determine the longevity of someone between 51 to 80.

The test is pretty simple. Go from standing to sitting cross-legged, and then go back to standing without using any parts of your body besides your legs and core to help you get up and down. The test measures multiple longevity factors, including heart health, balance, agility, core and leg strength and flexibility.

You begin the test with a score of 10 and subtract points on your way up and down for doing the following:

Hand used for support: -1 point

Knee used for support: -1 point

Forearm used for support: -1 point

One hand on knee or thigh: -1 point

Side of leg used for support: -1 point

A 2012 study published by the European Society of Cardiology found a correlation between the SRT score and how long people live. The study was conducted on 2002 people, 68% of whom were men, who performed the SRT test and were followed by researchers in the coming years. The study found that “Musculoskeletal fitness, as assessed by SRT, was a significant predictor of mortality in 51–80-year-old subjects.”

Those who scored in the lowest range, 0 to 3, had up to a 6 times greater chance of dying than those in the highest scores (8 to 10). About 40% of those in the 0 to 3 range died within 11 years of the study.

Azar distilled the study on "Today," saying: "The study found that the lower the score, you were seven times more likely to die in the next six years.”

"Eight points or higher is what you want," Azar said. "As we get older, we spend time talking cardiovascular health and aerobic fitness, but balance, flexibility and agility are also really important," she stressed.

One should note that the people who scored lowest on the test were the oldest, giving them an elevated risk of death.

Dr. Greg Hartley, Board Certified Geriatric Clinical Specialist and associate professor at the University of Miami, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that we should take the study with a grain of salt. “Frailty, strength, muscle mass, physical performance—those things are all correlated to mortality, but I would caution everybody that correlation doesn’t mean causation,” he said.

And of course, the test doesn't take into account injuries or disabilities that may make doing the test impossible. But one of the study's authors says that the study is a call to take our mobility seriously.

“The more active we are the better we can accommodate stressors, the more likely we are to handle something bad that happens down the road,” Dr. Claudio Gil Araujo, told USA Today.


This article originally appeared on 3.10.23

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Pop Culture

Kathy Najimy’s 1993 interview for 'Hocus Pocus' is going viral for the sweetest reason

'I just feel supportive of all groups, whether they’re women’s groups or gay groups or racial groups, and I know that there are groups of witches out there.'

Kathy Najimy/Wikicommons/Hocus Pocus/Wikicommons

Kathy Najimy's 1993 interview for "Hocus Pocus" is going viral.

If you grew up in the '90s, chances are you watched the original "Hocus Pocus" and declared yourself one of the three Sanderson sisters. But did you know that Kathy Najimy was committed to being respectful of practicing witches when she first read the script for the movie in the early '90s? Me either. A resurfaced video of Najimy has recently gone viral on TikTok showing an interview by Katie Couric on the "Today" show. In the video, Najimy expresses the importance of being respectful of other people, cultures and things she may not understand, including practicing witches.

In present day, this is not something that anyone would provide fanfare around, because we absolutely should be respectful of others in our art form. It's something that people have been working extremely hard at for the past several years as we've evolved as a whole. But in 1993, things like cultural appropriation and mindfulness of people who were different from the majority was essentially scoffed at publicly. Funnily enough, in the interview Najimy says, "At the risk of having America roll their eyes, I just feel supportive of all groups, whether they’re women’s groups or gay groups or racial groups, and I know that there are groups of witches out there."

The exchange between Najimy and Couric is just wholesome because even in today's world, this level of genuine compassion around things you don't understand is refreshing. Najimy explained to the host, "This is really perpetuating a stereotype about an evil ugly witch and I know that there are groups of really strong women who sort of bond together, within our very spiritual and powerful. I didn’t want to be part of perpetuating that myth."

But Najimy wasn't done. She went on to talk about the steps she took to make sure she was remaining respectful, including voicing her concerns to higher-ups and Gloria Steinem. Yeah, she called in one of the queens of women's rights to talk through her hesitation. The entire interaction is fascinating. Watch the video below.

@theriveroaksredneck #hocuspocus #hocuspocus2 #kathynijmy #bettemidler #sarahjessicaparker #gloriasteinem #womansrighttochoose #feministiktok #fyp #fypシ #foryoupage ♬ original sound - Robert

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Family

A NICU nurse was so loving to their baby, the parents asked her to be godmother

She needed to be in his life.

via Pixabay

Lucky baby gets the most caring godmother.

It’s a little funny that there are people who make tremendous differences in our lives that we never speak to again when their job is done. People in the healthcare profession regularly save people’s lives and then, after we thank them, we're likely to never see them again.

That’s why this story is so touching. A family appreciated the work of a NICU nurse so much, they asked her to be part of the family.

Good Morning America reports that when Austyn Evans was pregnant with her son Conrad, she and her husband, Branden, learned that he had a rare birth defect known as lower urinary tract obstructions. The defect can be life-threatening, so Austyn and Branden moved from Florida to Houston in her third trimester so she and Conrad could be cared for at Texas Children's Hospital.

"It's a very bad diagnosis to get," Austyn told Good Morning America. “A lot of these kids do not survive past zero or they just survive a few days past birth."

As soon as Conrad was born he was rushed into the neonatal intensive care unit where he was cared for by Carly Miller, 27, a NICU nurse at the hospital.

“Carly was instantly charismatic and funny. She kept talking about how cute Conrad was,” Austyn told Today. “The way she talked to him when she was doing his vitals or she was taking blood, she was constantly talking to him in this really cute little mom voice and trying to be as comforting as she could even though he was extremely sedated.”

Conrad’s needs were so intense that he would often be Carly’s only patient. She regularly worked the night shift, so when Austyn would call, she’d hear about Conrad’s condition from Carly.

"She never started a phone call telling me all the bad. It was always, 'Oh my gosh, he's so cute,' or, 'All the nurses think he's so cute,' and then obviously I'd get the medical report," Austyn told Good Morning America. "It was such a small thing but it helped immensely."

The relationship meant the world to the Evans family because they were all alone in Texas.

“We were so isolated because of COVID and being away from our family,” Austyn told Today. “A relationship that was so professional over time became so personal to me.” When it came time for Conrad to be moved to a complex dialysis machine, Carly learned how to work it so she could remain by Conrad's side.

After six months of round-the-clock care, Conrad was finally able to go home with his family. Even though the family had moved on to the next stage of their lives, they knew they couldn’t walk away from the woman who meant so much to them.

“We kept everything as professional as we could in the NICU but just the conversations we had sitting in his hospital room or the victories that we celebrated and we cried over together were really important to me,” Evans told Today. “Thinking about leaving that place and having to never see Carly again was heart-wrenching.”

To make it official, the couple gave Carly some flowers with a card from Conrad with a note attached that read, "Will you be my godmother?"

Carly said yes.

"I just feel very honored," Carly told Good Morning America. "It's something I never expected and the fact that they wanted me to do that for him means the absolute world."

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Joy

Neighbors rally to throw an epic early Halloween party for a boy with terminal cancer

Nearly 1,000 people showed up to make sure it was a lasting positive memory.

Photo by Rohan Reddy on Unsplash

Halloween should be a time of pure joy for kids.

It’s not every day that an act of kindness looks like a parade of witches, zombies and monsters. But for the Hurdakis family, it’s one they’ll likely never forget.

According to CBC, 5-year-old Alexandros Hurdakis had undergone surgeries, chemotherapy and radiation to fight ependymoma (a brain tumor that forms in the brain or spinal cord) for most of his young life. On top of these intense and expensive therapies, Alex uses a tracheostomy tube to breathe and eats with a gastrostomy tube. Despite his challenges, nothing stops him from “lighting up a room.”

Though the treatments did help, eventually his tumor grew back, and his parents, Nick and Kira, finally received the message they had been dreading—the cancer was now terminal. The family’s GoFundMe page shared on Sept. 8 that doctors expected them to lose Alex “within a week.”

Alex’s heartfelt wish was to celebrate Halloween by seeing the monsters at the haunted house in Niagara Falls. Though doctors said Alex would have to stay close to home, the entire community stepped up to bring Halloween to him..

A lot of the credit goes to Paula Tzouanakis Anderson, a family friend who blasted the community group page on Facebook looking for some basic decorations to build a modest haunted house.

Tzouanakis Anderson received an overwhelming amount of response from people wanting to help. So much so that she asked city officials to block off the street in preparation for a bona fide block party.

Alex wished for monsters and he got them. People paraded through the street dressed as dinosaurs, witches, zombies, Freddy Krueger, Darth Vader and more. Even English bulldog Rubble from “PAW Patrol” (one of Alex's faves) showed up. There were decked-out cars and motorcycles, plus festive face painters and cotton candy vendors. It was an all-out banger, and it became possible in a little over two days.

The expected guest count was initially 200. They had somewhere around 1000.

"I started crying," Tzouanakis Anderson told CBC on Sept. 15, the day after the party. "So many individuals came together to make this night great.”

"We never expected so many people to help out," Nick added. "It was something else. There are no words."

As for Alex, he enjoyed giving everyone high-fives well into the night, despite being tired. "[Alex] was waving to every single person in the crowd. He knew it was for him …. You could see the love in his eyes,” Tzouanakis Anderson said.

Support from the neighborhood continued to roll in long after the party had ended, as they were able to gather donations to help the Hurdakis family cover medical expenses during such a difficult time. Halloween is a time for fun and magic, and these strangers showed up in a big way to ensure Alex wouldn’t miss out. His time might be limited, but he got to experience the pure joy of the holiday, thanks to a loving community. This is humanity at its best. If you’d like to donate to the Hurdakis family, you can find their GoFundMe page here.

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