on long lived physician

[Guest guest]

All

this was in the Huftington Post site today; it's both on CR and longevity. the

url is

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/23/shigeaki-hinohara-the-97y_n_190859.html

cheers,

Arturo

At the age of 97 years and 4 months, Shigeaki Hinohara is one of the world's

longest-serving physicians and educators. Hinohara's magic touch is legendary:

Since 1941 he has been healing patients at St. Luke's International Hospital in

Tokyo and teaching at St. Luke's College of Nursing. After World War II, he

envisioned a world-class hospital and college springing from the ruins of Tokyo;

thanks to his pioneering spirit and business savvy, the doctor turned these

institutions into the nation's top medical facility and nursing school. Today he

serves as chairman of the board of trustees at both organizations.. Always

willing to try new things, he has published around 150 books since his 75th

birthday, including one " Living Long, Living Good " that has sold more than 1.2

million copies. As the founder of the New Elderly Movement, Hinohara encourages

others to live a long and happy life, a quest in which no role model is better

than the doctor himself.

Energy comes from feeling good, not from eating well or sleeping a lot. We all

remember how as children, when we were having fun, we often forgot to eat or

sleep. I believe that we can keep that attitude as adults, too. It's best not to

tire the body with too many rules such as lunchtime and bedtime.

All people who live long regardless of nationality, race or gender share one

thing in common:None are overweight... For breakfast I drink coffee, a glass of

milk and some orange juice with a tablespoon of olive oil in it. Olive oil is

great for the arteries and keeps my skin healthy. Lunch is milk and a few

cookies, or nothing when I am too busy to eat. I never get hungry because I

focus on my work.. Dinner is veggies, a bit of fish and rice, and, twice a week,

100 grams of lean meat...

Always plan ahead. My schedule book is already full until 2014, with lectures

and my usual hospital work. In 2016 I'll have some fun, though: I plan to attend

the Tokyo Olympics!

There is no need to ever retire, but if one must, it should be a lot later than

65. The current retirement age was set at 65 half a century ago, when the

average life-expectancy in Japan was 68 years and only 125 Japanese were over

100 years old. Today, Japanese women live to be around 86 and men 80, and we

have 36,000 centenarians in our country.. In 20 years we will have about 50,000

people over the age of 100...

Share what you know. I give 150 lectures a year, some for 100 elementary-school

children, others for 4,500 business people.. I usually speak for 60 to 90

minutes, standing, to stay strong.

When a doctor recommends you take a test or have some surgery, ask whether the

doctor would suggest that his or her spouse or children go through such a

procedure. Contrary to popular belief, doctors can't cure everyone. So why cause

unnecessary pain with surgery I think music and animal therapy can help more

than most doctors imagine.

To stay healthy, always take the stairs and carry your own stuff. I take two

stairs at a time, to get my muscles moving.

My inspiration is Browning's poem " Abt Vogler. " My father used to read it

to me. It encourages us to make big art, not small scribbles. It says to try to

draw a circle so huge that there is no way we can finish it while we are alive.

All we see is an arch; the rest is beyond our vision but it is there in the

distance.

Pain is mysterious, and having fun is the best way to forget it. If a child has

a toothache, and you start playing a game together, he or she immediately

forgets the pain. Hospitals must cater to the basic need of patients: We all

want to have fun. At St. Luke's we have music and animal therapies, and art

classes.

Don't be crazy about amassing material things. Remember: You don't know when

your number is up, and you can't take it with you to the next place.

Hospitals must be designed and prepared for major disasters, and they must

accept every patient who appears at their doors. We designed St.... Luke's so we

can operate anywhere: in the basement, in the corridors, in the chapel. Most

people thought I was crazy to prepare for a catastrophe, but on March 20, 1995,

I was unfortunately proven right when members of the Aum Shinrikyu religious

cult launched a terrorist attack in the Tokyo subway. We accepted 740 victims

and in two hours figured out that it was sarin gas that had hit them. Sadly we

lost one person, but we saved 739 lives.

Science alone can't cure or help people. Science lumps us all together, but

illness is individual. Each person is unique, and diseases are connected to

their hearts. To know the illness and help people, we need liberal and visual

arts, not just medical ones.

Life is filled with incidents. On March 31, 1970, when I was 59 years old, I

boarded the Yodogo, a flight from Tokyo to Fukuoka. It was a beautiful sunny

morning, and as Mount Fuji came into sight, the plane was hijacked by the

Japanese Communist League-Red Army Faction. I spent the next four days

handcuffed to my seat in 40-degree heat. As a doctor, I looked at it all as an

experiment and was amazed at how the body slowed down in a crisis.

Find a role model and aim to achieve even more than they could ever do. My

father went to the United States in 1900 to study at DukeUniversity in North

Carolina. He was a pioneer and one of my heroes. Later I found a few more life

guides, and when I am stuck, I ask myself how they would deal with the problem.

It's wonderful to live long. Until one is 60 years old, it is easy to work for

one's family and to achieve one's goals. But in our later years, we should

strive to contribute to society. Since the age of 65, I have worked as a

volunteer.. I still put in 18 hours seven days a week and love every minute of

it.