Muscles: 9 Reasons They Matter

By Mila McManus, MD

Muscles play a key role in longevity, metabolic health, and stability.  Here are nine reasons to take your muscle health seriously, especially as you age:

• Muscle is metabolically active, consuming and storing more glucose, or blood sugar, than any other tissue. It is essentially a giant sink for glucose and helps to stabilize blood sugar.
• When you lose muscle, it slows metabolism, increases insulin resistance, raises cortisol, and lowers growth hormones and testosterone, thereby increasing inflammation, disease, and weight gain.
• The more muscle mass you have, the better your body can store glucose without gaining weight. Reducing carbohydrates with having significant muscle mass results in fat/weight loss.
• Muscles operate on a use-it-or-lose-it principle; as we age they diminish in size, also known as sarcopenia. By the time you are 70, you may have lost 40 percent, if not more, of your muscle mass, leading to falls and broken hips, which often, for the elderly, leads to death.
• Muscle size and strength are dependent on their interactions with the nervous system. Strength training boosts both muscle and nervous system interaction.
• Strength is the key to self-sufficiency. Strength training improves balance, gait, and ability to squat down to pick up a box, climb a stairwell, or tend to a garden.
• Weightlifting one to two times per week, in addition to 150 minutes a week of moderate aerobic activity, is associated with a 41 percent lower risk of dying.
• One consistent finding: More frequency is generally better regarding weightlifting, but some is better than none! Good results can come from a 30-minute session of strength training twice a week.
• Sarcopenia can be reversed at any age, so it’s not too late to start.

Whatever route you take to build muscle, keep it fun and interesting.  Great methods include Pilates, lifting weights, using resistance bands, joining a gym, working out at home using an app or online video, signing up for a boot camp, or joining a fitness group class. Life is short. Get started!

Be strong. Be well.

References:

Dow, Caitlin. PhD.(November 15, 2022)  7 reasons to strengthen your muscles. Nutrition Action Newsletter from the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

The Woodlands Institute for Health & Wellness - Mila McManus MD

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