Forget your birth certificate. How old is your body?
Want to know your ‘health age’? Use our ‘health age’ calculator to find out.
Are you older or younger than your “health age”?
Use The Australian’s Health Age calculator to find out.
Australians live a long time compared to the rest of the world, ranking third in life expectancy.
A boy born today can expect to live to 81.2 years, and a baby girl to 85.3 years.
But around a decade of our lives is likely to be lived in poor health.
And 32 per cent of Australian adults have a Body Mass Index of 30 or higher, according to the World Health Organisation, putting us high on the list of developed countries.
How are you doing? Key in your data to the calculator to find out your “health age”.
If it is older than your actual age, this may mean you have risk factors for chronic disease such as heart disease or diabetes.
You may need to consider taking action in terms of lifestyle changes. It might even prompt you to visit your GP for a check-up.
If your “health age” comes out of the calculator as the same as or lower than your actual age, don’t treat it as an excuse to lapse into bad health habits. Maintain a good amount of exercise and keep your diet healthy, with plenty of vegetables.
What does the ‘health age’ calculator do?
The calculator asks you for information about your diet, exercise, and medical check-ups. Each response is weighted to come up with an overall “health age”.
The “health age” measure is indicative only and does not take into account genetic factors only detectable through blood tests.
What does your score mean?
Health age younger than chronological age
Keep doing what you’re doing, eat lots of vegetables and keep exercising.
Health age the same as your chronological age
Keep doing what you’re doing, eat lots of vegetables and keep exercising.
Measure yourself again in a few months to see if you can bring your biological age down!
Health age 5-10 years older than chronological age
Take some action. Reduce smoking and drinking. Make an effort to lose weight. Take a blood test to check blood sugar and cholesterol. Review family history of disease.
Health age 10-15 years older than chronological age
Consider going to your GP to test for diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease and advice on weight loss and exercise. Consider meal replacement programs.
Health age 15-plus years older than chronological age
This is serious. Think about making an appointment with your GP. A medical assessment is essential to check for undetected disease. Aggressive intervention including weight loss medications may be needed.
This calculator has been developed based on methodologies used by the Mayo Clinic and World Health Organisation and leverages a Frailty Index to estimate an individual’s health age (biological) compared to their real age (chronological)
