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What if the most effective way to protect your long-term health isn’t found in a prescription, but in your daily habits? In longevity medicine, lifestyle remains one of our most powerful tools, and one of the most overlooked.
In this issue, we examine a 21-year randomised study published in JAMA that put a lifestyle programme head-to-head with metformin, a widely used diabetes drug. We look at what the findings reveal about the long-term impact of lifestyle intervention, and what they mean for how we practise healthy longevity medicine at Chi Longevity.
Lifestyle remains one of the most powerful longevity interventions we have
A study published in JAMA in June 2026 followed adults with prediabetes for 21 years, comparing an intensive lifestyle programme with metformin (a first-line diabetes medication) or placebo.
The intervention focused on achievable, sustained lifestyle modifications, including regular physical activity and healthier dietary habits, delivered through structured coaching, with modest weight loss as a key goal.
Participants in the lifestyle programme were 21% less likely to develop two or more chronic conditions than those receiving a placebo, and 25% less likely to develop three or more. Metformin did not demonstrate comparable long-term benefit.
Notably, the effect held up even after diabetes was removed from the count of chronic conditions, showing the benefit goes beyond diabetes alone.
Perhaps the most important insight here is not that lifestyle reduces diabetes risk; that has been established for many years.
What this study adds is long-term evidence that lifestyle change may slow the build-up of chronic disease across multiple body systems at once. The goal is not simply to prevent one condition, but to preserve function, independence, and quality of life by keeping multiple systems healthy over time.
At Chi Longevity, this principle underpins every personalised programme. Lifestyle is not simply a preamble to more sophisticated interventions; it remains the intervention supported by the strongest long-term evidence.
Comprehensive clinical assessment, using relevant biomarkers, allows us to apply that evidence with greater precision: identifying where lifestyle changes are likely to have the greatest individual impact, monitoring whether they are working, and determining when additional interventions may be appropriate.
Scientific discoveries become meaningful only when they improve clinical care. Our role is to critically appraise emerging evidence, understand its limitations, and translate it into personalised, evidence-based strategies that help people live healthier for longer.
If you would like to learn more about our evidence-based approach to healthy longevity, our clinical team would be pleased to speak with you.
Book a call with our team today →
Reference Salive ME, Tjaden AH, Ames JR, et al. Lifestyle and Metformin Interventions and Risk of Multimorbidity in Adults With Prediabetes. JAMA. Published online 15 June 2026. doi:10.1001/jama.2026.8492.
Chi Longevity NMN Is Now Available
Our NMN supplement is now available through Chi Longevity programmes. Developed with Prof. Andrea Maier and formulated to >99% purity, it is prescribed within the Maier Method: assessment first, supplementation second. NMN is only introduced when your biology indicates it may be beneficial, with dosage personalised to your individual health profile and monitored over time.
If you have questions or would like to explore whether it’s appropriate for you, our team is happy to discuss.
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In The News: Chi Longevity in Tatler Best Series
We recently joined the Tatler Best Takeover Series 2026 at Four Seasons Hotel Singapore, bringing personalised assessments and conversations on healthy ageing to the table. Quite literally.
