To begin the process of treatment your healthcare practitioner needs to determine your health status. He/she may carry out tests for antioxidant status, digestive analysis, immune system function, hormone status and circulatory condition. Your lifestyle will also be discussed for any contributory factors that may require attention.

An electrocardiogram (testing heart function), electroencephalogram (testing the brain) or electroretinography (testing vision) may be employed. X-rays and ultrasound may also be used. Prevention, or at least early diagnosis and treatment of disease, is the key to successful health.

However, general practitioners are ‘interventionists’ not ‘protectionists’, i.e. they are taught how to intervene with disease and stop the furthering of symptoms, but not in how to prevent the body from reaching that state in the first place. With practitioners being generally untrained in this area, prevention is therefore difficult in a conventional medical society.

The responsibility for prevention, or at least recognising and monitoring age-related changes when they do occur, remains with you. Your body gives you continuous signals of its state of health. It is up to you to learn about these changes and recognise what your body is telling you. You can then act accordingly to get your body back to optimum health and maintain a regime to keep it there.