‘Every single patient of mine could benefit from going out and playing golf’

I speak as a general practitioner and a family guy who has kids that are 11, nine, and seven and a mum and dad who are 75 and 74.

Sometimes I would advise medication. Sometimes I would prescribe a trip to the surgeon for my patients – because I know these are things that for the right person can get them better.

But almost every single patient of mine could benefit from going out and playing golf. The reason for that is if you go from being a non-golfer to a golfer, you’re likely to live five years longer.

It’s good for the brain. On average, people that are physically active are going to be much happier. There’s the odd shot that might frustrate you, but there’s also the odd one where you’ll puff out your chest and feel like the world makes sense.

If you’re physically active and play golf, you’re much less likely to get dementia, anxiety or depression, and it’s a good treatment for any of these things.

Although you are slightly more likely to have skin cancer or certain types of back pain, you’re far less likely to die early, to get type 2 diabetes, heart attack, strokes, certain types of cancer, or be less able to do the things you want to do when you’re older.

For happiness, for health, for productivity, for life expectancy, golf is an absolute winner and it’s a sport that can be played right across the lifespan.

My seven-year-old plays very happily, as do my parents, and I love playing golf so you can get our and do these things together.

If you’re a golfer reading this, please get a family member, a friend, or a work colleague into it. Golf is the single best present you can give someone to improve their happiness and their health. They’ll probably even live a bit longer as well.

There numbers are amazing when you consider them: Golf help prevent and treat 40 major chronic diseases; players walk between four and five miles; spectators can burn more than 1,000 calories a day. It’s remarkable…

Those numbers are incredible. For the average golf round, you’ll probably use between 800 and 1200 calories. That is a good amount of walking and it’s a good amount of exercise.

It’s good for strength and balance and it’s a concrete thing that you can do to improve your health if you do it regularly.

It’s also a good way people can lose weight or even maintain weight. If I’m sitting in my doctor’s surgery, we can always talk about restricting what people eat but it’s almost a ‘what can you do?’

If you say you can do a bit more walking, an easy way to do that is to play golf – because people get a bit bored if they go for walks regularly. But if you give them a dog, as a walking coach, or a set of clubs, they tend to be happy.

And we can walk a round of golf long after we’ve had to stop playing other sports…

That’s the beauty of it. I played a lot of sports growing up and there are very view I can do with  my seven-year-old, my girls, and my parents.

We can all go out. We can hit a few golf balls. We can go upstairs. We can have a coffee and a drink. There are very few sports that are played right across the life course.

In Scotland, it’s very rare for sports to be played over 80 but, in terms of golf, you still see massive participation at that age group. You see really strong participation for kids, really strong participation for younger adults, but for older adults too.

It was Kylie Minogue that said, ‘It’s never too late. You’ve still got time’. I say that to all patients. A lot of patients will say, ‘I’m too fat, too old, I’m too whatever’.

For golf, these things are simply not true. There’s always an opportunity to get out and hit a few golf balls on the driving range or at your local course.

Motion is lotion, so any form of movement is better than being on the couch and the more you do the better.

The beauty about golf is you’re not on the couch for four or five hours, if you are playing a full round. You’re also walking, which has got cardiovascular benefits, metabolic benefits, brain benefits – as has running or cycling.

There is also the strength and balance involved in transferring weight and swinging. It’s fairly comprehensive in all those things.

If you take the walking component out, if you’re at the driving range for example, or if you’re riding a golf cart instead of walking a golf course, then you lose some of those benefits. But you still have quite a few benefits that are there.

It’s a virtuous circle…

Everyone stands to benefit. As a doctor, I just want my patients to be well. As a dad, I want my kids to be well and I want them to be happy.

But the wider population does benefits. If you’ve got fewer people having hip fractures, types of cancer, type 2 diabetes and obesity, then clearly that’s going to be good for the economy as well.

There are some quick wins that work in addition to golf. If golfers are looking for things that can help take a few shots off their score, then it’s fairly simple.

There are obviously technical things but sleep like a champion. Try and get yourself between seven and eight and a half hours sleep per night. That’s what the best players in the world do.

Try and fuel for the work involved as well. See if you can get regular meals, regular hydration, a bit of caffeine before 2pm but not after, and good quality protein, good quality carbs, and healthy fats – rather than some of the junk we sometimes get in supermarkets or other places.

If you look at what we would provide at DP World Tour, or R&A events, the players really have got a diet that benefits their golf as well as their brain and their function more widely.

The third thing is just doing a bit of a warm-up. If you get straight out of the car and a bang a ball straight off the 1st then you are more likely to get injured and you’re more likely to add a shot or two to your score than if you do a seven-minute warm-up that gets your heart rate up, going through the bag, swinging a few clubs.