Scientists believe that they can run a blood test to check how fast an individual’s internal organs are ageing, and even predict which ones might fail.
The Stanford University team say they can monitor 11 major body parts, including the lungs, heart and brain. They tried it on many adults, mostly middle-aged or older. The results suggest that one in five healthy adults aged 50-plus might have at least one fast-ageing organ.
In every 100 one or two might have many organs which test older than their birth years.
While the idea of the check-up might be terrifying, it could be an opportunity to intervene and change course and knowing which organs are in rapid decline could help reveal what health issues may be looming, says researchers.
In the study, having one or more organs ageing fast was connected with a higher risk of certain diseases and death over the next 15 years.
The body parts which they checked include, muscle, pancreas, immune tissue, blood vessels, intestine, kidney, fat, liver, lung, heart and brain.
The blood test looks for levels of many proteins to give hints on which organs are ageing at different rates. The pattern of proteins which were detected appeared to be specific in certain organs.
Researchers trained a machine-learning algorithm to make the predictions using many bloods test results and patient data.
Dr Tony Wyss-Coray, is one of the investigators says that, when we compared each of these organs’ biological age for each person with its counterparts among a large group of individuals without severe diseases, we found that 18.4% of those aged 50 or older had at least one organ aging significantly more rapidly than the average.
And we found that these people are at heightened risk for disease in that particular organ in the next 15 years. Presently the university has submitted the paperwork to patent the test, in case it can be used and sold in the future.
More studies are required to find out how good it really is at predicting organ age and health before that though. Some of Dr Wyss-Coray’s earlier work suggests that the biological ageing process is not steady but comes in bursts, with some rapid accelerations in individuals who are mid-30s, early-60s and late-70s.
Prof James Timmons, an expert in age-related health and diseases at Queen Mary University of London, has also been studying blood markers of biological age. His work focuses on detectable gene changes, rather than proteins.
He said the latest findings by Dr Wyss-Coray were impressive, but needed validating in more individuals, mainly younger ones from diverse ethnic backgrounds.
Dr Wyss-Coray says that, if we can reproduce this finding in 50,000 or 100,000 people, then it will mean that by monitoring the health of peoples organs in healthy individuals, then we might be able to find organs which are undergoing accelerated ageing in people’s bodies, and we might be able to treat people before they get sick.
Prof Paul Sheils, an expert in the biology of ageing at Glasgow University says that it is still important to look at the whole body, not just individual organs, to build the most exact picture of a person’s health.
Caroline Abrahams from the charity Age UK said while it was great that science was exploring earlier detection of serious age-related diseases, consideration was needed about how individuals might feel living with the knowledge.
Should it become a reality, she said individuals would want emotional and clinical support alongside the test results and that the NHS would need to be ready for that and have the funding to provide it.
