Here's something you're not going to want to hear: Exhibit and event professionals age faster than people outside the face-to-face marketing industry. But it's not just the wear and tear of an admittedly stressful occupation that demands you view the world as one big Plan B waiting to pounce.

The medical culprit behind this phenomenon would never stymie the medical sleuths of “House” or even the goofballs of “Scrubs.” In fact, it's fairly straight forward: According to Scott Cohen, professor of tourism and transport and school director of research at the University of Surrey, disruption of your sleep-wake cycle and circadian rhythms stresses your system. A slew of scientific studies backs this up, especially in academic periodicals such as the “Journal of Travel Medicine” and “Travel Medicine and Infectious Disease.” The research linked frequent business travel to not only accelerated aging, but also an increase in the probability of suffering a stroke, heart attack, and deep-vein thrombosis (the latter occurs when blood clots block blood vessels or the heart). Moreover, Cohen asserts that the jet lag and general tiredness you experience running to and from airports “can even switch off genes that are linked to the immune system.” This means your ability to fend off the sundry bugs and viruses encountered in crowded airports, cramped airplanes, and jam-packed convention centers is reduced, adding yet another tier to this layer cake of stress.

Here's something else you're not going to want to hear: The problem is much worse than experiencing premature crow's feet and suffering a nasty travel bug or other physical ailments. A survey done by Opinium Research found that most business trips (unlike those beach vacations in Cancun or honeymoons in Paris) are about as mentally relaxing as seats in economy are for plus-size fliers. To put it bluntly, business travelers are practically why Xanax was invented, because Opinium found most of the members of this always-on-the-go group suffer from a variety of mental ailments, including exhaustion (32 percent), stress (30 percent), and anxiety (28 percent). It's not hard to see why these occur with such frequency when you tally up the grinding stressors of endless security lines, unfamiliar surroundings, technical glitches, weather delays, and long hours. The chronic jet lag that often accompanies frequent flying, Cohen notes, can even cause memory impairment, aggravating all of these problems even more.

What's the solution? Giving up all travel and limiting your marketing tactics to the “Hollywood Squares”-like world of Zoom isn't a realistic option in our post-COVID, return-to-normalcy work world. So with the help of several experts on business travel and health, we've gathered a menagerie of effective fixes that may not turn back the clock, but will help you keep your body healthy and your soul in shape.

Stay Grounded
The common denominator for many of these ailments is flying. Cohen suggests frequent business travelers take advantage of alternate means of getting from point A to point B, such as hopping a train instead of flying. While this tip may apply more to those who live in the eastern corridor of the United States or in train-friendly Europe, his prescription has several advantages. Ground travel might be substantially less stressful with its lack of needing to arrive at an airport hours early and navigating long security lines, and the frustration that comes with potential weather delays, uncomfortable seating, and dry air. “If you must fly,” Cohen says, “take direct flights instead of connecting ones when possible since connections will only add to your exhaustion.”

Jet Lag Is a Drag
Also known as “time zone change syndrome” or “desynchronosis,” jet lag is the bane of business travelers trying to stay sharp and rested while they're on the road. The phenomenon occurs when your body has to eat, sleep, wake up, and work at different times than when it's used to, putting the brain cells regulating circadian rhythms out of sync with the time zone you're in. The catchy, benign-sounding term itself — “jet lag” — masks the fact it can lead to severe trouble sleeping, worsening the already diminishing effect it has on mental and physical performance.

The more time zones you cross, the harder jet lag will likely hit you, especially when it comes to getting sufficient ZZZs. Age may bring wisdom, but it also brings more difficulty with jet lag: The older you are, the more likely it is you'll suffer from jet lag and the harder it will be to return to your normal sleep schedule when you're at home.

To beat jet lag, you have to anticipate it. One trick is steadily shifting your body clock to your destination time zone before flying out. For example, if you were flying from Boston to Los Angeles, which is three hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time, you should start going to bed an hour earlier every day for several days before you leave.

That advice may be tougher if you were jetting from Chicago to Paris with its six-hour difference, since moving your bedtime from the hypothetical 11 p.m. to 5 p.m. would be problematic (unless you're the early-bird special type). Still, you can likely progress to getting to bed at least two or three hours earlier before you board that flight, making you much more able to adjust quickly once you arrive in the City of Lights.

If You Snooze, You Win
The key to beating jet lag, plainly, is getting enough sleep. If it seems like you spend your nights on the road tossing and turning when you should be snoring, however, you're not imagining things. Studies that were compiled by travel-payment-services company AirPlus International found that business travelers average 21 fewer minutes of sleep per night compared to non-business travelers. The effects of this sleep deprivation snowball, leading to a 12-percent decline in how fast they can recover from any stressful situation encountered on the road, which lowers productivity and increases the risk of illness and disease.

Add Dr. Neil Slabbert's suggestion to your itinerary. “Set your watch to your destination time when you arrive at the airport,” says Slabbert, the regional chief medical officer-Asia-Pacific for World Travel Protection, a travel risk management service, “and time your sleep and naps accordingly. Try to use an eye mask and ear plugs when sleeping.” Lastly, “Avoid alcohol and caffeinated drinks starting a few hours before bedtime,” he says, “and try to follow your usual bedtime routines from home.”

Another tool to think about using is melatonin, the hormone that plays a starring role in setting the body's circadian rhythm. Once your eyes perceive onsetting darkness after sunset, your hypothalamus knows it's time to begin releasing melatonin, which promotes sleep.

While currently there is no set-in-stone recommended dose for melatonin supplements, the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital advises a 0.5 mg to 5 mg dose of melatonin one hour prior to bedtime at your travel destination, which should be enough to convince your brain and body that it's time to hit the proverbial hay. If that doesn't ease you into the arms of Morpheus, they then recommend 1 mg to 5 mg one hour before bedtime for two days before you depart on that business trip, and for two to three days upon arrival.

Drink and Thrive
Now, when we advocate drinking, we mean less Harvey Wallbanger and more H2O. Flying is an inherent vector for disease with passengers sitting as close as eggs in a carton. An airplane cabin is a microclimate of recirculated, dry air, and you're in close contact for several hours with people who could have anything from a common cold to COVID.

Although you can't control the air or your fellow passengers' health (or the lack thereof), you can at least take one preventive measure: drink lots of water. Proper hydration keeps you from overheating and empowers the skin and mucous-membrane cells to bodycheck bacteria. It also helps by reducing nasal irritation when coughing, sneezing, or even when you're simply breathing.

Travel-wellness expert John Ayo has a rule of thumb he follows religiously when it comes to hydration. “I definitely recommend drinking at least half your body weight in ounces daily,” he says. If you're 150 pounds, drink 75 ounces per day of water. But when you're flying, he suggests upping that to about eight ounces per hour of flying time. Meaning, for instance, on a three-hour flight, you'd have to imbibe 24 ounces of water.

If plain water is just too boring, consider sipping an alternative, such as coconut water. Made from the clear liquid inside young coconuts, it's ideal for staying hydrated because it contains natural electrolytes (the essential substances that balance your body's water levels and move nutrients into cells) and potassium levels.

You don't have to lug around a carry-on bag's worth of Evian bottles, either. Several foods can provide substantial amounts of water, notes Caroline Susie, registered dietitian nutritionist, licensed dietitian and national spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. “Fresh fruits and vegetables like tomatoes, melons, grapes, cucumber, watermelon, and foods like broth-based soups can help with hydration,” she says. “Most Americans do not meet the recommended amount of fruit and vegetable consumption anyway, so this is a way to meet that standard and hydrate.”

Food for Thought
According to a survey that was conducted by On Call International, a travel-risk-management company, 44 percent of business travelers are more likely to eat unhealthy meals while on the road than they would at home. Traveling is a hard-to-avoid opportunity to binge on novel cuisines and new restaurants, which would explain why Andrew Rundle, associate professor of epidemiology at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, has found in his research that road warriors who spend 14 nights or more a month away from home tend to have a substantially higher body mass index (BMI) than those who don't travel.

Although you don't need to adhere to a strict regimen of broccoli with a tofu chaser, it remains critical to work nutritious food into your daily regimen to stay well. Of course, this is easier said than done since it's much simpler to opt for the Cheesecake Factory than chia seeds, especially if you're drinking and dining with clients or colleagues. But here's a serving of effective fixes that are easy to swallow.

First, carry some healthy snacks like fruits and nuts with you during the day. “In my carry-on, I always have raw nuts,” says Susie. “Unsalted nuts and fruits are high in fiber, tend to keep you sated longer between meals, and are easy to transport.” Further, she suggests cereals, seeds, and energy bars, which can also make good options for nibbling between meals. Yogurt — especially Greek yogurt — is high in calcium, and an excellent source of probiotics, which can keep your digestive system on track while out of town or even abroad. The overall effect of this food routine is that you'll be less likely to binge at meals, and more likely to avoid issues with your scale and your stomach when you arrive home.

A side benefit of having healthy snacks, Susie notes, is that in the event of flight delays or cancellations, instead of opting for junk food to kill your down time, you can nosh on something that will help keep your cholesterol down and caloric intake in check. If you run out of healthy snacks from home, most airports have improved in healthy offerings nowadays, with yogurt, hummus, protein bars, dried fruit, and more readily available.E