Background and Objectives

As life expectancy increases, the number of older people in Germany is also growing. At the same time, it is becoming increasingly important to understand which factors help people remain physically, cognitively and mentally healthy and independent into old age. The biological, medical and social mechanisms underlying the ageing process are complex and are not yet fully understood. The Gutenberg Healthy Ageing Study therefore investigates which factors promote healthy ageing and which conditions are essential for maintaining physical performance, cognitive fitness, mental well-being and functional health later in life. To this end, comprehensive information on participants’ health status and potential influencing factors such as lifestyle, physical activity, nutrition and environmental factors is collected. To better understand how people who age healthily differ from people of the same age with health conditions, the collected data are compared, among other things, with data from participants of the same age in other studies, such as the Gutenberg Health Study. The findings provide an important basis for developing new approaches to the prevention, early detection and treatment of age-related diseases, as well as measures to promote health in the population. In the long term, the study aims to help more people live healthy and independent lives into old age.

The aim of the Gutenberg Healthy Ageing Study (GHA) is to examine older people from Mainz and the surrounding region in order to learn which factors have contributed to their remaining healthy into old age or being able to manage their everyday lives without major limitations. Two groups are examined for this purpose.