The 10 Questions You Should Be Asking Your Doctor

These are the top 10 questions that will increase your risk of having the best overall health as you get older.

UPDATED: August 5th, 2025

Welcome to the Healthy Aging Newsletter, a free publication translating trustworthy medical research into simple habits to age well, free of chronic disease. I’m Dr. Ashori, a family medicine doctor turned health coach. 

Asking Your Doctor The Right Questions

We don’t get a lot of time with our doctors these days so it’s important to make the best use of your time in those first few sessions. After all, this is the doctor who’ll take care of you well into your golden years, helping you prevent chronic diseases, stay healthy, and live well.

Many doctors, like myself, have designed their practice around 1-hour long appointments, encouraging these deeper conversations. If your doctor has the traditional 7-10 minute appointment slots, this article should help you get the most out of it for your overall, long-term health.

1. What disease am I at highest risk for?

Each and every human body is unique and has a unique risk profile. This is often determined by their lifestyle, where they live in the world, and family history.

A good physician can help you identify the diseases you’re at highest risk for. We know, for example, that diabetes, cancer, heart disease, and dementia are the most common conditions people will suffer from after their 30s and 40s. For some it’s more dementia and less cancer. For someone else it’s heart disease. What’s your biggest risk and what are you doing about it?

2. What are early signs of chronic disease?

There will be months between your doctor appointments. It’s good to know what to look for in case they are early signs of a chronic condition.

Signs of inflammation is an important one to look for. Another might be sleep changes, strength or mobility issues, and digestion changes. While the most important step is to recognize these signs, it’s also necessary to know what to do about them.

“Michael and I had talked about his risk of diabetes given his strong family history. He recognized some of the early symptoms himself and we knew we had to step in to prevent him from ever developing diabetes.”

3. How can I protect my brain against dementia?

What are you doing now that is putting you at risk for a neurodegenerative condition and what important actions can help you slide into old age with a sharp mind and a strong body?

We know that dementia has potentially 7 stages - each offering an opportunity for intervening before it’s no longer reversible.

For most the risk of dementia is all about insulin sensitivity, while for others it’s lack of exercise or excess stress. Knowing your particular cues and risks can help you prevent common chronic diseases like Alzheimer’s dementia.

4. What can I do to prevent cancer?

Cancer is often an unfortunate chance mutation that can take a normal cell and turn it into an unhinged factory destroying important structures around it. In most cancers, the signal to stop reproducing is turned off.

Our body has the ability to recognize rogue cells and we can help our immune system perform better and destroy them before cancer cells are formed or cells seed in distant sites.

Are you at risk of cancer? Any family history of it? If so, what might be your biggest trigger risk, maybe it’s insulin resistance, or inflammation, or obesity or stress.

5. Is my body composition changing appropriately with age?

As we age, our bodies change. The most common changes are shifting of fatty tissue, muscle loss, and skin changes. Some muscle loss is perfectly fine but too much and we run into mobility problems and metabolic disease.

It’s important to know what’s abnormal and what’s considered normal aging. Your doctor can help you look for any early signs and offer tests that can catch such conditions early.

6. Am I on track to avoid diabetes?

More and more people are developing diabetes. And though we are also winning on the pharmaceutical front, a medication won’t cure diabetes. Even the best GLP1s will leave a person with diabetes a few decades short of healthy years.

We have many tests that we can do to determine the risk of diabetes in a person. It’s important to know which tests to perform but more importantly which lifestyle changes to encourage in patients.

7. What tests will help us determine my health risk over the next decade?

Some of my patients are at highest risk of depression, obesity, frailty, cancer, osteoporosis, or dementia. A good family history might tell me a lot but sometimes I need specialized testing to find out what they are at risk for.

Once we determine risk we can adjust someone’s lifestyle, habits, and even offer medications, when appropriate.

8. Are my lifestyle changes making a difference?

Thanks to better medical technology we can use tools to determine if someone’s lifestyle changes are having the necessary impact. A dietary change should improve inflammatory markers, lipid levels, and blood pressure or else we’re going down the wrong path.

While I’m not a big fan of unnecessary testing, when someone is at high risk for a certain medical condition, it’s important to track their progress.

“Unfortunately, I missed a major hidden risk in one of my patients who later developed a major tear in his main aorta. Had we screened him much earlier for sleep apnea I think we could have avoided this tragedy and lifelong disability.”

9. How do I prevent heart disease?

Heart disease is broad term we use for heart attacks, strokes, and heart failure. We know it’s one of the most common diseases in the US and we also know that it’s among the most preventable.

Exercise, nutrition, and stress management are quite important. But for some people it’s simply a biochemical problem that may require cholesterol lowering medications. Fortunately, we have many more options than the old statins of a few decades ago.

And remember, heart disease is not just a cholesterol problem. In this article I go over all the other factors often overlooked when trying to lower cardiovascular disease risk.

10. How is my mental health?

Mental health is easily overlooked and can be as impactful as knowing what your cholesterol and blood pressure numbers are. If you believe in mind-body medicine then you’ll know the importance of a healthy outlook on life and cultivating interpersonal relationships.

“I’ve noticed that my patients who aren’t able to deal with certain emotional issues in their 30s and 40s end up with much more severe mental health problems later. We identify it early and intervene appropriately.”

Finding the Right Doctor

I realize that healthcare in Western countries is complicated, hard to navigate, and quite polarized. But there are more and more doctors who genuinely care about their patients and want to help them avoid a disease before it ever sets in.

The modern primary care doctor is more of a friend, confidant. You can text them, email, and do a live session usually the same day. That’s what it means to be a primary doctor for someone. I’ve spent years perfecting my medical practice to meet my patients where they are, make it easy for them to understand their health, support them, and keep them healthy well into their old age.