Why is retirement harmful to health

Retirement is a slow death?

Brian Borzikowski, BBCAs a number of studies show, retirement has a bad effect on health.

A BBC Capital correspondent tried to figure out why.

In 2003, Harry Prosen left the position of head of the psychiatric department at the Medical College of Wisconsin, but the 71-year-old doctor did not plan to retire. He decided to focus on other activities so as not to sit idly by.

Now Prosen is 83 years old, he still sees several patients, consults a number of organizations, recently reviewed a 600-page manuscript for a friend and regularly studies several medical publications - just to "keep his finger on the pulse," he claims.

But it's not just the love of work that makes Harry Prosen give her 30 hours a week in his ninth decade. He believes that being constantly busy with something is vital.

Prosen is sure that if he stops working at all, he will die soon.

Perhaps he is not far from the truth. According to a report published in May 2013 by the London Institute of Economic Problems, the probability of depression in newly-made pensioners increases by 40%, and the chances that they will find at least one disease increase by 60%. These data were obtained after checking a control sample of people for age-specific diseases and ailments.

Gabriel Salgren, head of the research unit at the Center for Market Education Reform and author of the above-mentioned report, was surprised at how unhealthy retirement is. Nine thousand people from 11 European countries participated in his study. As it turned out, they have similar problems.

In the first year after retirement, a person's health usually improved ("It's good to take a little break from work," says Salgren), but after two or three years, the mental and physical condition of pensioners began to deteriorate.

The results of other studies confirm these conclusions. From 1992 to 2005, Dhawal Dave, associate professor of economics at Bentley University in Waltham, Massachusetts (USA), monitored the condition of 12 thousand Americans and found that, on average, for six years after retirement, a person is diagnosed with some kind of disease. According to Dave, among the common diagnoses are hypertension, cardiovascular diseases, stroke and arthritis. In addition, he found out that pensioners are more likely to become depressed.

Although the retirement age varies from country to country – for example, in China men end their careers at 60, in India the retirement age ranges between 60 and 65, and in Norway it is 67 – the results of the study of residents of other countries are generally similar. Both physical and mental problems worsen with retirement, regardless of how old a pensioner is – 65 or 75.

What is the reason?There are a number of prerequisites for the deterioration of health after retirement, explains Dhwal Dave, but the most important of them is the loss of a social environment that stimulates a person.

For many people, work is the place where they are most socially and physically active. When basic social contacts cease to be relevant, health degrades.

"If this interaction with other people disappears, you become more lonely," says Gabriel Salgren. "Research shows that loneliness leads to mental illness, and they, in turn, can cause physical illness, because you stop taking care of yourself."

A decline in income levels can also affect health, says Salgren. A person who receives less money can start buying cheaper products, go to the doctor less often and refuse a gym membership, the expert explains.

Mary Peterson doesn't need research to figure out how retirement affects health. This resident of the Canadian city of Muskoka in Ontario is already over 60, she is surrounded mainly by people of retirement age, and she knows firsthand how lack of work affects a person.

According to Peterson, her surgeon friend had a stroke two months after retirement, and another friend of hers started having memory problems after he sat in front of the TV for six months. "When a job disappears, most people have no idea what to do," she says. "And this, in turn, leads to degradation."

Mary Peterson's husband ended a busy career in the financial sector at the age of 55. Four years later, he was diagnosed with cancer. Retirement is unlikely to have affected the fact that he was ill, but Mary had a similar idea. "Health is a strange thing," she says.

Her husband was able to cope with the disease, and now he is a healthy 66-year-old man. However, he did not stay at home after leaving work – according to his wife, this is what helped him maintain mental and physical health. He decided to take up singing, which he had dreamed of all his life, signed up for vocal classes and studies almost every day. Mary Peterson is sure that her husband is alive and well thanks to singing.

How to deal with the deterioration of health?Observing his friends and acquaintances, psychiatrist Harry Prosen notes: the healthiest of them are still working, doing volunteering, sports, and leading an active social life.

This, according to researchers, is the salvation from health problems in retirement. Pensioners need to fill the void that appears in their social and physical activity after leaving work – and with activities that stimulate them, says Dhawal Dave.

There is, of course, another option: you can continue to work. Gabriel Salgren notes: human life expectancy is now higher than ever. In many countries, people on average live up to 80 years or even longer, 10 years more than in 1960. All the less reason to retire at 65.

Salgren does not offer to work until you die right at your desk. He just thinks that it's not worth retiring suddenly. The best alternative for many, according to the expert, is a gradual reduction in workload. "It may be worth reviewing the socially accepted balance between work and retirement," he says. "Then we will have a chance to avoid some of the negative consequences of retirement."

Although Harry Prosen does not rule out that sooner or later he will stop taking patients, his plans include working in one capacity or another until a serious illness prevents this. "Of course, Alzheimer's can knock me down," he laughs, "but only over my dead body!"

Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru16.09.2014