Age Management
A New Preventive-Medicine Program For The Spa
by Vincent Giampapa, M.D., F.A.C.S.
 The burgeoning baby-boomer population has been a contributing
factor to the skyrocketing popularity of the resort/destination spa and
day/medical spa. Baby boomers mainly are concerned with maintaining their
optimal health and wellness in aging as efficiently as possible. Age management
as a new wellness and preventive-medicine program can target the aging
baby-boomer market that is looking for new ways to look and feel young again.
New anti-aging
research has been focusing on our DNA. The
Human Genome Project completed just a few years ago documented at the most
fundamental level that the origin of aging and health actually lies at the level
of our DNA. The information revealed now is being utilized directly at the
resort/destination-spa level and medical-spa level.
This is the first time that optimal wellness and
preventive-medicine programs have been presented to the general public. It’s
also the first time these programs can be personalized based on the genetic deck
of cards a spa-goer has inherited. Without a question, this approach for
preventive medicine and wellness will set future trends for the spa market for
decades to come.
Aging At The Cellular Level
The scientific research published over the last few years has
documented that aging really is a combination of events that occurs at the
cellular level. In one of 100 trillion cells that make up the human body, there
are four key processes that are directly involved with aging—and these are
directly controlled by specific sets of genes.
Paramount to all of these cell mechanisms is a process of
repairing damage that we suffer to our DNA. Maintaining and restoring optimal
function and status to our DNA is the key to optimal aging and preventing the
diseases of aging that normally occur with age.
A multitude of recent papers have documented that the more
efficiently we are able to repair our DNA, the more efficiently the cells that
make up our body can make copies of themselves as they are damaged and out due
to the stress and pace of the 21st-century lifestyle. With new advances in
non-invasive testing that can be accomplished at the spa location or even at the
spa-goers’ home, now we have the ability to directly measure this key
biomarker of aging.
Over the last few years, additional research has documented
that it is not just inherited DNA that is important, but the environment in
which it is placed that actually results in the optimal use of genetic
inheritance. Therefore it is the combination of DNA and the environment in which
it is placed that in reality determines the quality of our health as well as the
length of our lives.
DNA-Based Programs
The spa is an ideal environment to introduce an age-management
program. Spas now have the opportunity to offer a new wellness service
that is personalized for the client and that will generate ongoing revenues with
the sales of testing, nutraceuticals and topical creams.
There are many programs based on the latest in science and
technology that provide a cutting-edge, forward-thinking, spa-based program to
the highly educated clientele who seek resort/destination vacations as well as
regular day spa visits. One program integrates a targeted regimen of nutraceuticals,
which create an ongoing revenue stream.
A spa can offer this new DNA-based age-management program by
providing testing or selling the tests at the spa. The tests are sent to
independent labs and provide a personal age-management evaluation and
recommended regimen of products for the client. The client then returns to the
spa to purchase his or her regimen. A follow-up assessment every four months
brings the client back to the spa for retesting and reordering products for
optimal aging. The follow-up tests provide a biomarker to chart overall DNA
damage and free-radical levels, which will decrease dramatically after several
months of the personalized regimen.
Although this program is medically based in nature, an on-site
doctor is not necessarily needed to promote it.
The incorporation of a preventive-medicine/wellness program
focusing on restoring optimal health and improving quality of life is a
component that all spa environments are seeking. To begin, spas can implement
age-management programs such as an optimal-aging-themed week, DNA facials, or
the introduction of antiaging supplements.
Combined with the rejuvenating and relaxing treatments already
in place at the spa, an optimal program should focus on stress reduction (a
major cause of aging due to elevated cortisol levels), nutrition (via healthy
foods/diet), supplements and exercise (such as yoga or Pilates®).
Measuring, focusing and treating the most fundamental source
of health, disease and aging—our DNA—will become the future trend for the
spa market and the spa-goers even after they return home.
Dr. Vincent C. Giampapa is chairman and chief science officer
of Suracell. He also directs the Plastic Surgery Center International and
Giampapa Institute for Anti-Aging Medical Therapy in Montclair, N.J. He sits on
the medical advisory board for the Medical Spa Society.
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