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How Long Will You Live? This DIY Test Could Reveal Your Life Expectancy

Do you want to know? We're not sure we do, but it'll be hard to resist finding out.

We've all wondered whether the meaning of life could be distilled into a relatively straight forward formula.

We might still have a long way to go before we can distill the whole universe into one little equation, but there is a new formula that could give us important answers about our own lives.

Scientists claim to have worked out an equation that, if carried out correctly, could tell us very important things about our current life expectancies.

Good news, right?

Hop on a treadmill and find out!
Hop on a treadmill and find out!

Well, the even better news is that you can do the maths yourself. All you need access to is a treadmill and a calculator (unless you're a genius with numbers, in which case, lose the calculator).

The test involves running on a treadmill, in a series of three-minute bursts, at increasing speeds and inclines.

So - if you haven't set foot on a treadmill in years, you might want to visit your GP before trying this out on your own.

The speeds and inclines aren't particularly tough overall though, so if you've been taking part in regular, gentle exercise, you should be fine.

Once you have made a note of some vital statistics, whilst doing your treadmill bursts, you can then input them into the formula and hey presto, you'll be able to understand your mortality risk over the next ten years.

Why The Test Works

The test was developed at the John Hopkins University in America, after leading cardiologists examined 58,000 stress exams.

As leading scientist Haitham Ahmed explains, "The notion that being in good physical shape portends lower death risk is by no means new."

"But we wanted to quantify that risk precisely by age, gender and fitness level, and do so with an elegantly simple equation that requires no additional fancy testing beyond the standard stress test," he continued.

And so that is what they have done.

On top of age and gender, the test takes into account METs - metabolic equivalents - which are an indicator of how much energy the body uses during exercise.

[Rex]
[Rex]

The Test Itself

So, first things first, find yourself a treadmill, and take a pen and paper with you to note down your max heart rate during each interval.

Start at stage one, for three minutes, then move onto stage two without a rest in between. Keep moving up to the next stage every three minutes until you really can't do it anymore.

And then stop. Find out which number of METs you stopped at and use that to input into the formula.

Word to the wise: it might look easy enough, but don't be fooled by the speed, the incline makes this harder than you might imagine.

Stage 1 - 1.7 mph/10 per cent grade/5 METs

Stage 2 - 2.5 mph/12 per cent grade/7 METs

Stage 3 - 3.4 mph/14 per cent grade/10 METs

Stage 4 - 4.2 mph/16 per cent grade/13 METs

Stage 5 - 5.0 mph/18 per cent grade/15 METs

Stage 6 - 5.5 mph/20 per cent grade/18 METs

Stage 7 - 5.5 mph/22 per cent grade/20 METs

Here's the formula:

(12 x METs) + (% of maximum predicted heart rate) – (4 x age) + 43 if female.

Maximum predicted heart rate is calculated as 220 minus your age.

To find out your % of maximum predicted heart rate - take the max heart rate you recorded during the last stage of your test, then divide it by the maximum PREDICTED heart rate, times it by 100.

The Results

If you have at least zero, your survival rate is 97 percent in the next decade. In the study, scores ranged from negative 200 to positive 200.

If you score 100 or higher, you have have a two percent risk of dying over the next 10 years, while those with scores between 0 and 100 face a three per cent death risk over the next decade.

If you have a score between negative 100 and 0 had an 11 per cent risk of dying in the next 10 years, while scores lower than negative 100 have a 38 per cent risk of dying.

And there you have it.

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Will you be trying out this test for yourself? Let us know in the comments!