We are all familiar with the term life span and the concern inflation and social security changes may impact living a long life. Today, we are going to talk about “health span” and what we need to think about as we live longer, and hopefully healthier, in retirement.

The term health span is great even though we might not use it that often. If you want to try and define it, the National Institutes of Health say it’s the period of life spent in good health, free from chronic diseases and disabilities of aging.

As you can tell from that definition, living a long life isn’t the same for everyone. Without a lengthy health span, you won’t get to enjoy your retirement as much as someone who does.

Here’s some of what we discuss in this episode:

• The average lifespan is about 79 for women and 73 for men, which dropped for the first time in 25 years.
• What are the leading causes of death today compared to the year 1900.
• How your health span factors into planning and determining how much money you need.
• What we encourage our clients to do in order to maintain that health span.
• If you have any questions about what we discussed in this episode, please reach out and we’d be happy to provide answers.

Resources for this episode: 

Healthspan concept –

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6136295/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGSkpIRs6pc

Life Expectancy –

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/nchs_press_releases/2022/20220831.htm

https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R44846.pdf

https://www.worldometers.info/demographics/life-expectancy/

Cause of death 1900 vs 2000 –

https://carolinademography.cpc.unc.edu/2014/06/16/mortality-and-cause-of-death-1900-v-2010/