Childhood trauma might promote faster cellular aging in people, a new study suggests.
Adults who had experienced stress as kids appeared to have an increased risk of shorter telomeres, which are found at the ends of a person's chromosomes. And that might increase the risk of illness and early death in adulthood, said lead researcher Eli Puterman. He is director of the Fitness, Aging & Stress Lab at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.
Puterman added that the increased risk of faster cellular aging is "relative" -- and not every person who suffers childhood traumas will wind up ill later in life.
"This doesn't mean that every single person has short telomeres," he said. "It just means there's an increased risk."
[For more of this story, written by Dennis Thompson, go to https://consumer.healthday.com...dy-finds-715457.html]
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