Do Protein Needs Change as You Age? - Ask a Nutritionist

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Transcript

Brandy: Well, hello, and welcome back to “Ask a Nutritionist”, our weekly mini episode of Dishing Up Nutrition. My name is Brandy Buro. I'm a Licensed and Registered Dietitian here at Nutritional Weight & Wellness. And today we're answering the question, do our protein needs actually change as we get older?

I'm sure a lot of you are wondering. It's been a hot topic lately, and maybe you've heard that older adults should be loading up on protein to stay strong. But what does that actually look like if we think about what you would be eating in a day? Well, before we talk numbers, let's remember why protein matters.

Why protein matters

Protein is made of amino acids. Those are the building blocks that your body uses to make and repair all of your tissues. So it is important for muscles, but it also supports your bones, it makes hormones and enzymes, it supports your immune system, it helps you heal after an injury and illness, and it helps you stay fuller after meals, so it can be very crucial in preventing cravings, and it can be really important in a weight management program.

So protein is not just about muscles. Every single cell in your body depends on it. And your protein requirements shift depending on what your body is doing and what phase of life you're in. So when you're young and you're growing, you need protein to build new tissue, to build that skeleton and those muscles.

As an adult, you're mostly just maintaining what you built in those formative years. As we get older, especially after the age of 50, your body becomes less efficient at using that protein to maintain that muscle. That often means that you need more protein, not less, in order to stay healthy and resilient into your older years.

The trouble is that while your protein needs do increase, your appetite often decreases as we get older. So there's a mismatch there, and that can make it pretty challenging for some people to eat enough protein. Some people are probably drastically under-eating protein as they age when the opposite should be happening.

How much protein is recommended?

So let's get into some of the numbers. How much protein should we be eating? For healthy adults, the current recommended dietary allowance is 0.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day. But here's the important part. That RDA is just the minimum amount that we need to prevent deficiency, to prevent disease.

That is not the optimal level. It is not enough to promote muscle health or support healthy aging or to help with weight management. So here at Nutritional Weight & Wellness, we are recommending a lot more than that, especially for adults over the age of forty, we are suggesting 1.6 grams per kilogram per day.

If somebody is more active or healing from a surgery or an illness, I usually recommend a little bit more, closer to 1.8-2 grams per kilogram per day. So what does all of that mean in a real-life example? So let's say somebody is a hundred and fifty pounds. Well, one point six grams of protein per kilogram is going to work out to be about a hundred and twelve grams of protein a day.

In terms of cooked meat or fish, that's going to be sixteen ounces of cooked meat or fish. So this might look something like thirty to thirty-five grams of protein three times a day or four to five ounces of meat with breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and another two ounces with a snack.

A caveat to this method of estimating your protein needs is if a person is overweight or obese, of course, that protein number is going to be higher, and that may be a little more challenging. It may not actually be very realistic for a lot of people.

So if you're just using your weight and you are obese or overweight it may be more appropriate to use something called your ideal body weight to estimate your protein needs. Ideal body weight is just a standard weight based on your height.

I'll just give you a quick example. For somebody that is five-four, your ideal body, your ideal body weight is 120, so you could use that number to calculate your protein needs.

Why do protein needs increase as we get older?

Well, let me explain just a little bit more about why protein needs do increase as we get older. One of the biggest changes that happens as we age is something called anabolic resistance. Anabolic resistance is just a fancy way of saying your muscles don't respond to protein quite as efficiently as they used to.

When you're younger, eating protein easily stimulates muscle building. As you age, your muscles require a much larger protein stimulus to achieve the same response. At the same time, we naturally begin to lose some muscle starting around as early as age 30, especially if you're not consistently using them.

If you're not doing regular resistance or strength training, that muscle mass quickly comes off, and it just accelerates more after the age of 60. Without enough protein and regular strength training, we will lose muscle, we will lose strength, and that compromises our balance, and honestly, it compromises our independence.

So this age-related muscle loss, there's a name for it, it's called sarcopenia, and it is a huge threat to our health outcomes in later age. Maintaining muscle is not just about looking good or looking fit and toned. Muscle is more about your resilience and your longevity and your independence.

Muscle is what's going to allow you to climb your stairs, carrying your groceries. It's going to prevent a fall from a little stumble or a little trip, which is going to prevent a break. It's going to help you recover from illness a lot faster. So overall, maintaining your muscle is maintaining your independence.

These are all issues that become especially important later in life. I think we all want to live as independently for as long as we can. So going back to that RDA of zero point eight grams per kilogram, honestly, that is just not enough for older adults. If you are over the age of 40, and certainly over the age of 50 or 60, you need to be thinking more.

So we recommend at the very minimum four ounces of animal-based protein three times a day. Many adults may actually need closer to five or six ounces three times a day. There are seven grams of protein per ounce of cooked meat or fish, so that's going to work out to be 30 to 40 grams of protein per meal for most people.

Some people need a little bit more, especially if somebody's recovering from, like a knee replacement surgery or an illness. Those protein needs definitely go up. A helpful strategy to achieve this goal is spread that protein throughout the day. Instead of just banking on a really good dinner with a, a nice steak or something, we really should be trying to get that four to five ounces at every meal, hopefully you're eating three meals a day, and perhaps two ounces with a snack.

Some people may even have two snacks in a day. I would say breakfast is a particularly important meal to focus on getting this protein in. Really try to make it a priority to include at least four ounces or 30 grams of protein with that first meal of the day. That's going to help stimulate muscle building right away, and it's going to halt some of that muscle breakdown that naturally happens while you sleep.

So research has shown that this pattern of eating a good breakfast with at least 30 grams of protein is much more effective than eating a very small breakfast or skipping it altogether. I know skipping breakfast tends to be a habit some of us can fall into, but recognize how important that is to building, maintaining muscle, and maintaining your resilience as you age.

Does menopause impact protein requirements?

Now, let's think about a question that comes up a lot. Does menopause impact your protein requirements? Excellent question. I'm sure a lot of you are wondering. The hormonal changes that occur during perimenopause and menopause, especially the declining estrogen levels, can increase muscle loss and reduce your muscle strength over time.

During this time, you may also experience more abdominal fat, reduced bone density, slower recovery from exercise. Because of all of those changes, many experts encourage women in midlife to increase their protein intake. Protein plus resistance exercise, strength training, weight training, that is the ticket to help preserve your muscle mass and support healthy aging.

I always recommend meeting with a dietitian at any stage in your life, but especially as you are entering perimenopause and menopause and beyond. We have to do what we can do to stay ahead of all those concerns, especially when it comes to muscle loss.

Muscle loss precipitates much bigger issues down the line that can, quite frankly, become very dangerous for women. So I always work with my clients to create protein-rich meals that seem realistic, that seem like they would enjoy them, so that eating this protein does not feel like a chore. If it feels like a chore, it's not going to happen, but the fact is it has to happen if you want to, if you want to live an independent life.

Protein-filled meal & snack ideas 

So let me share with you a couple ideas of what eating this amount of protein might look like to hit your protein goals. Okay, so for breakfast, for me an easy choice is an egg bake or a frittata.

I always use two eggs with usually one or two ounces of ham, maybe a half a cup of egg whites, and I pair that with some sautéed kale and mushrooms. If you tolerate dairy, you could sprinkle on one or two ounces of cheese, and that would be additional protein.

Now for lunch. Something that I've been making lately is this curry chicken salad. I just use some rotisserie chicken. There's a great recipe on our website, weightandwellness.com. And I just put that over some mixed greens with some cherry tomatoes, and that's an excellent lunch with four or five ounces of protein.

Next up, let's talk snacks. Snacks are a great opportunity to get more protein in. One recipe that I enjoy are the peanut butter protein balls. It's a great meal prep recipe. It's grab and go, really quick in the middle of your workday or whatever you're doing. But two of those is going to give you about fifteen grams of protein, and that's coming from a grass-fed protein powder.

So I like that option because it's a little different from eating meat or eggs, again, and just gives you a little bit of variety. You could also do something like Greek yogurt or cottage cheese with berries. That could be a quick option. Or maybe even just, you know, three or four little meatballs left over from dinner the night before. That would also work.

Now let's talk about dinner. For myself, tonight I'm going to make burrito bowls. So I have planned some seasoned ground beef, so I would do about five ounces of seasoned ground beef over some black beans, cauliflower rice, lettuce, salsa, and guacamole. Delicious, easy to make, also a great meal prep recipe.

So this approach of eating this amount of protein demonstrates we are not doing it in one lump sum. We are breaking it up evenly throughout the day. That is the best way to support your muscle maintenance, and it's going to help you feel satiated throughout the day. So you are satisfied and good with just these meals. You're not going to find yourself snacking and picking at the candy jar or going to the pantry multiple times a day.

Protein quality matters

One thing I do want to point out about the quality of protein you choose, we do want to try to get most of our protein from animal-based sources. Protein from animal-based sources is much easier for our bodies to absorb, and it's very concentrated.

Animal-based proteins are mostly just protein. We do get some protein from things like beans and legumes and nuts and seeds, and that all contributes, but it just doesn't have as much protein, so you end up needing to eat a large volume of those things before you kind of hit that protein goal that we've just discussed.

Perfectly fine foods to incorporate in a, a meal plan regularly, but we just want to make sure that we are including some animal-based sources so we are getting the amount of protein that we need and not guessing. Protein powder is a great way to sort of fill in the gaps and give you an alternative to animal-based proteins if you're getting a little burnt out on meat or fish.

For many people, it can fill in the gaps. Especially as we get older, if you are-- your appetite isn't what it used to be, protein powder can come in handy. It's also very convenient, something you can have in a gym bag and mix in your water bottle on the way home.

It's also convenient if you struggle digesting meat, so it gives you a good quality option to still get your protein. The protein powder that I use and really love is the grass-fed Wellness Whey from Nutrikey. I have tried so many different protein powders, and honestly, this one tastes the best, and I find that it blends, it mixes very well, so it's not clumpy, it's not chalky like a lot of the protein powders I've tried. So again, you can get that at nutrikey.net or any of the offices in the Twin Cities.

If you are looking for a dairy-free option, I know many folks are sensitive to even whey, there is a grass-fed beef protein isolate called Paleo Powder, so that's one you could try as well. Also tastes great, mixes very well, great option.

Shop Quality Protein Powder 

Key points 

Well, let's wrap up with the key points here today. Protein needs do change throughout life, and as we age, we need enough to maintain our muscle so that we can sustain our resilience and our independence. Older adults often need more protein because muscles do not respond as efficiently as they used to.

So for women, especially after menopause, prioritizing protein along with regular strength training can help preserve the muscle you have. You could even start to build some muscle, and that's all going to support your bone health, your metabolism, and maintain your independence as you age.

Now remember, the official RDA is just a minimum requirement. That is not what is optimal for optimal health. Women over 40, and certainly over age 60, or if you're in that post-menopausal phase, will benefit from a higher protein eating plan. These specifics will depend on your activity level and your specific health goals, so that's where I do encourage you to try to connect with one of the dietitians here at Nutritional Weight & Wellness.

Learn More About Nutrition Counseling

It can be so helpful to just figure out what your specific protein goal is and then develop a meal plan that you can live with, that you can enjoy, that actually hits those goals. Well, thank you so much for joining me today on today's episode of “Ask a Nutritionist”. If you found this episode helpful, the best way that you can support our podcast is share it with somebody that you think could benefit from listening.

And if you are interested in meeting with me or any one of the dietitians here at Nutritional Weight & Wellness, give us a call at 651-699-3438, or you can visit our website to learn more at weightandwellness.com. Well, thanks so much for listening today. I'll talk to you next time.