How would you like to die? This was precisely the question Aubrey de Grey, the chief science officer at the SENS Foundation, opened his TEDMED 2009 talk with. He gave us three options: cancer, diabetes or Alzheimer's. He seemed downright angry (yet tongue-in-cheek) that the elderly have lost the vigor and mental agility they had as young adults and while it's nice that they have more experience and wisdom, they don't have the strength to do much with it. "There the small cost of 200 billion dollars a year to keep the elderly going in a frail and decrepit state that for most increases their lifespan for a year or two." His SENS Foundation works on developing and promoting widespread access to regenerative medicine solutions to remedy the disabilities and diseases of aging.
What is aging? De Grey defines it as metabolism, which continually causes damage and damage eventually causes pathology. Slowing down the progression of the pathology is one way about it (geriatrics), but there's only so much we can do and ultimately people go downhill anyway, he says. His preferred approach? The maintenance approach: constantly repairing damage and keeping it down to a level that doesn't allow pathologies to emerge (hence he's had the reputation that he's on a quest to create immortality, a claim he says might be a side benefit of improving quality of life through time, but not the point). "Human bodies are just a machine," he says.
David Sinclair, co-founder of resforum.org for more information about resveratrol.
Following the conversation around aging, Eric Dishman, co-founder of the Center for Aging Services, Intel fellow, Digital Health Group, and behavioral scientist who studies aging behavior said behavioral markers matter in early diagnosis of a medical issue in the elderly. At Intel he's working on collecting actual household patterns and behavioral markers (24/7) like changes in postural sway, voice recognition response time upon answering a phone, gait and stride-length through different rooms in the house in order to predict an incident before it happens. For example, if someone is being monitored through time and their voice is softer each time they answer the phone over the course of months, it might be a sign of Parkinson's 5 to 10 years before any obvious medical condition presents itself. He stressed the important of a shift from mainframe to personal health care.
More to come later... keep checking back.
Here's to your health!
Live Blogging TEDMED 2009:
Follow Alana B. Elias Kornfeld on Twitter: www.twitter.com/alanaekornfeld
Alana B. Elias Kornfeld: TED MED 2009: The Missing Piece In ...
Alana B. Elias Kornfeld: TED MED 2009: The Future Of Cancer Medicine
Bionic Athlete Aimee Mullins To Speak at TEDMED 2009 - aimee ...
Kara Visits TEDMED (Featuring Synthetic Skin and Heart-Scanning ...
iRobot CEO to Outline the Future of Robotics in Healthcare at TEDMED
Loading comments… 
If you prefer, check the Greek Myths. Immortalit
By far better to plan for the future but live in the moment.
you might try checking out
www.nderf.
Everyone wants to live a long, healthy life--you can live for years and years with diabetes in good health if it's caught early and managed well. It's when complicati
Incidental
Molecular biology is now expanding at an explosive pace. What would happen if we were to push the rate of progress just that little bit more?
There is now an alliance of engineers, scientists
De Grey is a man with a mission. Consider this improbable scenario: a hitherto unknown Cambridge scientist realises he holds the key to saving the lives of countless millions. What should he do? In that situation what ought YOU do? This is not some improbable science-fi
I for one do not want to die.
-Warn the public
-Recruit voulunteer
-Secure funds
The Race is ON
"What's likely to happen within the next 20 to 25, 30 years, we will develop technology that will buy a bit of time. We will develop rejuvenati
-Aubrey de Grey: Chief Science Officer. SENS Foundation
Let's make it happen.
Let's Roll !
We were not designed to live long enough to turn into helpless, ugly, sick babies in our old age. Nature tries to kill us off then in so many ways.
We put old dogs to sleep so they won't suffer, but obligatory human suffering in old age is okay if there is profit in it or if religious authoritar
One of the worst mistakes made in our generation was to imprison Dr. Kevorkian, who tried bravely to end this suffering on people who wanted to die.
Your thoughts echo many of my own on the aging debate- and in supporting the premise and life work of Dr. Kevorkian.
I lost my dearest friend just 3 weeks ago. She was only 54 years old. She obviously could not predict her own tragedy. Unfortunat
POSTNOTE: Let us live life with care and consciousn
I am forty nine, it ain't that bad.
I've done it, but I'm sure that some philosophe
Additional
From the "I just wanna die before I get old" generation
nuff said.
cant sleep
cant poop on command
go to church too often
nursuing homes 45,000 a year,
Think of all the great minds that would still be with us today. We could have colonized other planets by now and would be exploring the universe.
Old age is a disease and living forever should be one of our goals. Anyone who says forever is too long is lying. That stems from the accept what you cannot change attitude.