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Your 60s: function starts to matter more than numbers

The markers that predicted risk in midlife start being outranked by what you can physically do. Falls, hearing, medication load and cognition become the things worth measuring.

This overview has not been through medical review yet

It is a signpost to pages that have been reviewed, and it is excluded from search until a named reviewer has signed it off. Everything it links to carries a reviewer and a review date; this page does not, so treat it as a map rather than as advice.

What actually changes

Falls become a mortality risk, not an inconvenience

Fall risk rises sharply through this decade and a fall with a fracture is a step change in trajectory rather than a setback. Balance, lower-limb strength and a medication review do more for this than any supplement.

Polypharmacy becomes its own hazard

Prescriptions accumulate, interactions multiply, and drugs started for a good reason a decade ago are rarely reviewed. A structured deprescribing review is one of the few interventions at this age with a plausible net benefit and almost no cost.

Hearing loss is a modifiable dementia risk factor

Untreated hearing loss is among the larger potentially modifiable contributors to dementia risk at a population level. Hearing is easy to test, aids are effective, and uptake is poor because it is treated as cosmetic.

Interventions graded in this group

Nothing in our catalogue carries a grade whose population names this group specifically. That is worth stating plainly rather than filling the space: what we have is evidence in mixed populations, and applying it here is an assumption.

Browse every graded intervention instead

Reference ranges drift with age, and a value that is "normal for your age" can still be worth acting on. Ask what the range is normalised against before accepting a reassurance.

Which tests matter, and when

Keep the metabolic and lipid panels, but add function: grip strength, gait speed, a sit-to-stand, hearing, and a medication review with a pharmacist or clinician. These predict the next decade better than anything on a blood panel.

No marker in our catalogue has a reference range sliced specifically for this group, so the general ranges apply. See the full range table.