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The length of time for which you can balance on one leg may be an important indicator of how well you’re aging, a study finds.
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Researchers from the Mayo Clinic found that how long a person can stand on one leg is a better measure of healthy aging than changes in upper or lower body strength or gait.
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Study authors explain what balance can tell you about your health as you get older, plus the length of time you should be working toward for optimal healthy aging.
There are plenty of factors that contribute to how well you’re aging. Things like what you do and don’t eat, how active you are, and whether you have any chronic illnesses provide important information regarding your health as you get older. But research suggests that there may be an even simpler indicator: how long you should stand on one leg. In fact, the length of time for which you can balance on one leg may say more about how well you’re aging than things like your muscle strength. Read on to discover what else the researchers found.
Meet the expert: Kenton Kaufman, Ph.D., senior author of the study and director of the Motion Analysis Laboratory at Mayo Clinic.
A small Mayo Clinic study published in PLOS One looked at 40 healthy, independent people over the age of 50—half of whom were under 65; the other half were 65 and older. Researchers used the following tests to assess age-related decline as well as differences between sexes.
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Grip strength: A handheld device was used to measure upper body strength.
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Knee strength: Knee extension exercises assessed lower body strength.
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Gait: Participants walked at their own pace on a designated path while a motion analysis system captured their movements.
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Balance: Participants stood on plates that measured balance during four different scenarios: on both feet with eyes open, on both feet with eyes closed, and on the dominant and non-dominant leg with eyes open. Participants could balance in any position they wanted, either holding onto their lifted leg or not.
Out of the four tests, researchers found that how long someone maintained their balance while standing on one leg showed “the highest rate of decline with age,” per Mayo Clinic. In other words, the results showed that the amount of time in which a person can stand on a dominant and non-dominant leg significantly decreased with age—and had a larger decline than gait and muscle strength.
More specifically, researchers determined that the duration a person can stand on a single leg declined at the rate of 2.2 seconds per decade in the non-dominant leg, while doing the same at the rate of 1.7 seconds per decade in the dominant leg. Researchers noted that these findings were true for all genders.
“Balance is an important measure because, in addition to muscle strength, it requires input from vision, the vestibular system [a sensory system in the inner ear that helps maintain balance], and the somatosensory systems [part of the nervous system that allows people to perceive sensations from the body, like touch, pressure, pain, temperature, and movement],” said Kenton Kaufman, Ph.D., senior author of the study and director of the Motion Analysis Laboratory at Mayo Clinic, in a statement. “Changes in balance are noteworthy. If you have poor balance, you’re at risk of falling, whether or not you’re moving. Falls are a severe health risk with serious consequences.”
The statement pointed out that the leading cause of injuries among adults who are 65 and older is unintentional falls—and most falls among older adults result from a loss of balance.
The bottom line
This research shows how balance may be used as a measurement of how well you are aging, but it’s not the first study to do so. A 2022 study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine affirmed that the ability to balance is linked to a longer life, finding that those who failed to stand on one leg for a 10-second balance test had an 84% increased risk of death over the next seven years.
The good news is that you can take steps to prevent this with balance exercises. “For example, by standing on one leg, you can train yourself to coordinate your muscle and vestibular responses to maintain correct balance. If you can stand on one leg for 30 seconds, you are doing well,” Dr. Kaufman said in the statement from Mayo Clinic.
“If you don’t use it, you lose it. If you use it, you maintain it,” Dr. Kaufman continued. “It’s easy to do. It doesn’t require special equipment, and you can do it every day.”
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