“People are naturally curious about what they can do to improve their health with aging. It can be a little confusing for people,” Espinoza told CBS LA co-anchors Sheba Turk and Jamie Yuccas. “That’s the reason we wanted to launch this clinic … to provide some evidence-based recommendations to the patients, individualized to what they can do to improve their health with aging.”

Although genetics plays a role in how people age, Espinoza considers lifestyle factors—including physical activity, sleep, diet and mental health—more important because they can be modified and nurtured.

“As we age, there is an increased risk for depression, anxiety and mental health issues,” Espinoza told Turk and Yuccas. “So, it’s important to keep your eye on those things and seek help if needed.” She added that the new Cedars-Sinai Healthspan Clinic provides mental health screening for patients and will offer referrals when needed.

Espinoza told Turk and Yuccas that the Healthspan Clinic accepts patients 18 and up but it is especially useful for people who have reached middle age.

“What we really want to do is help people before they have the impacts of a lot of chronic diseases, if we can,” Espinoza said. “But I do want to say, it’s never too late to make positive changes to improve your health.”

Watch the complete video from CBS LA.

Investigators at the Los Angeles Pepper Center will focus on extending older adults’ healthspan—which means aging with reduced burden of chronic diseases and conditions that lead to loss of independence—by studying interventions that target the biological processes of aging. Investigators then will translate those findings into clinical care.

“This prestigious grant provides Cedars-Sinai the opportunity to expand its geroscience research within our institution, across Los Angeles, and beyond, with the long-term goal of offering evidence-based healthy aging guidance for older adults,” said Sara Espinoza, MD, director of the Cedars-Sinai Center for Translational Geroscience.

For the next five years, Espinoza will lead the Los Angeles Pepper Center in collaboration with colleagues at USC and UCLA who say the combined expertise and resources of the three prominent institutions is a strong advantage.

“This partnership allows us to accelerate breakthroughs that can directly improve quality of life for older adults,” said Pinchas Cohen, MD, dean of the USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology and co-director of the new center.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention projects that nearly one-quarter of the U.S. population will be 65 or older by 2060. Researchers say this creates a critical need to address the onset of multiple chronic diseases linked to aging. By intervening in the aging process at the biological level, scientists aim to prevent, delay and treat multiple medical conditions simultaneously.

“This designation strengthens our commitment to addressing the health challenges of aging—not only for today’s older adults, but for future generations as well,” said Jonathan Wanagat, MD, PHD, a geriatrician at UCLA and co-director of the Pepper Center.

The Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center in Los Angeles has four aims: to further develop gerotherapeutics—drugs that target the underlying cellular aging processes—and increase the number of researchers, expand clinical trials, and share the latest findings in translational geroscience.

“The robust resources, network and infrastructure made possible by the NIH solidifies Los Angeles’ leading position in aging research and geriatric clinical care,” Espinoza said. 

Read more in Cedars-Sinai Discoveries Magazine: The Future of Aging Research

Healthcare professionals in the Healthspan Clinic concentrate on the prevention and treatment of age-related illnesses and disabilities like cognitive decline and impaired mobility. The clinic is open to patients 18 and older.

“Aging is the leading risk factor for developing multiple chronic conditions that diminish quality of life,” said Sara Espinoza, MD, medical director of the Cedars-Sinai Healthspan Clinic and a Gerontological Society of America fellow. “This unique clinic offers scientifically backed science with clinically proven treatment and lifestyle recommendations that can improve health and wellbeing—now—and as individuals age.”

While advancements in medicine like antibiotics, vaccines and childbirth care have increased the average U.S. lifespan, physician-scientists at Cedars-Sinai are more concerned with keeping patients healthy—not merely alive. The medical term is “healthspan,” and the clinic’s experts say their goal is to help adults stay healthy and independent as long as possible.

“To do so, it is important that our approach is guided by scientifically proven, evidence-based findings about the fundamental aging processes that are root-cause contributors to multiple disorders and diseases—in other words, the new field of geroscience,” said James Kirkland, MD, PhD, director of the Center for Advanced Gerotherapeutics at Cedars-Sinai.

Patients seeking care at Cedars-Sinai’s Healthspan Clinic participate in at least one in-person visit. Experts assess patients for physical and cognitive function, lifestyle factors such as diet and exercise, and overall health status.

Espinoza said these consultations are an opportunity to discuss healthy-aging goals and habits. Patients are provided guidance on lifestyle, such as diet, exercise and sleep quality. Patients in the Healthspan Clinic also can opt to participate in a biorepository that analyzes patients’ blood and other data to track biomarkers linked to the onset of diseases.

“This clinic is an opportunity to change the trajectory of a patient’s health before they have complex medical issues,” said Espinoza, also the director of the Center for Translational Geroscience at Cedars-Sinai, where investigators conduct clinical trials for medicines and lifestyle advances aimed at healthy aging.

Nicolas Musi, MD, director of Cedars-Sinai’s Diabetes and Aging Center and the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, and Kirkland are also part of the clinic and provide treatment recommendations for metabolism, endocrinology concerns, and questions regarding interventions that potentially affect fundamental aging processes.

Espinoza said Healthspan physicians can refer interested patients to geroscience clinical trials at Cedars-Sinai or through the Translational Geroscience Network—an international consortium studying the biology of aging to prevent, delay or treat age-related diseases.

The network comprises 90 clinical trials across the U.S. and northern Europe and is led by Kirkland. The National Institutes of Health recently renewed the Translational Geroscience Network grant, awarding nearly $3 million over the next four years.

“The NIH renewal allows the network to keep studying a range of conditions that accelerate aging, including long COVID, obesity and Alzheimer’s disease, to ultimately find new ways to help people age in better health,” Kirkland said.

As the Healthspan Clinic grows, Espinoza also plans to hire physical trainers and dietitians to help curate personalized diet and exercise plans for patients.

To make an appointment with the Healthspan Clinic, call 310-423-3870 and select option 1.

Read more from Discoveries: The Future of Aging Research

California Academic Geriatrics Institutions

“As clinicians and investigators from an institution that treats more patients over the age of 80 than any other academic medical center in the country, Cedars-Sinai’s aging experts appreciate the opportunity this conference provides to share research and clinical innovations with other academic geriatrics programs in California,” said Sonja Rosen, MD, chief of Geriatric Medicine at Cedars-Sinai, conference co-chair, and a fellow of the American Geriatrics Society and of the American College of Physicians.

Cedars-Sinai is recognized as an Age-Friendly Health System by The John A. Hartford Foundation and the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, in partnership with the American Hospital Association and the Catholic Health Association of the United States. The designation is given to health systems that integrate the “4 Ms”—mobility, mentation, medication safety and what matters most—into care for older patients. This recognition also was recently extended to the Ruth and Harry Roman Emergency Department at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

“We are focused on providing older adults with the evidence-backed care they need and deserve, while also conducting research that could one day lay the groundwork for an even more innovative standard of care,” said Sara Espinoza, MD, director of the Center for Translational Geroscience and a Gerontological Society of America fellow.

Cedars-Sinai experts who are attending the meeting and are available for interviews include:

Zaldy Tan, MD, MPH, medical director of the Jona Goldrich Center for Alzheimer’s and Memory Disorders, and director of the Memory and Healthy Aging Program, can discuss his research on reducing Alzheimer’s risk with healthy lifestyle interventions, screening for early cognitive impairment in hospitalized patients, and differences in health outcomes based on dementia status.

Sam Torbati, MD, medical director of the Ruth and Harry Roman Emergency Department, can discuss efficiencies in care of geriatric patients in the ED’s Observation Unit, the performance of high-sensitivity cardiac biomarkers in geriatric populations, and utility of a new three-protein assay in predicting bacterial infections among complex geriatric populations.

Allison Moser Mays, MD, MAS, geriatrician and assistant professor of Medicine, can discuss her research on social isolation, fall prevention, and recruitment of older adults into an online exercise program.

Hiroshi Gotanda, MD, PhD, geriatrician and assistant professor of Medicine, will present his research examining end-of-life care for older adults with dementia by race and ethnicity and physicians' roles. He can also discuss his broader research on the intersection of health policy and dementia care.

Kathleen Breda, MSN, NP, can discuss the Geriatric Fracture Program’s use of nurse-led transitional care to reduce hospital stays for older patients with hip fractures, as well as the Move to Recover Program, which mobilizes older, hospitalized orthopedic patients with complex cases to improve their health outcomes.

Katie Hren, MPH, LCSW, associate director of Cedars-Sinai’s Community Connect Program, can discuss the program’s effectiveness in screening and managing social determinants of health in older adults.

To schedule an interview, contact: Kelsie Sandoval at Kelsie.sandoval@cshs.org or 562-631-1169.