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The autonomic nervous system (ANS) regulates involuntary bodily functions such as blood pressure, heart rate, breathing, and digestion, in addition to controlling motivation and behavior. In older adults, the ANS is dysregulated, which changes the ability of the ANS to respond to physiological signals, regulate cardiovascular autonomic functionality, diminish gastric motility, and exacerbate sleep problems. For example, a decrease in heart rate variability, or the variation in the interval between heartbeats, is one of the most well-known alterations in the ANS associated with health issues, including cardiovascular diseases and cognitive decline. The inability to perform fundamental activities of daily living and compromising the physiological reactivity or motivational responses of older adults to moving toward or away from specific environmental stimuli are significant negative consequences of chronic and geriatric conditions that pose grave threats to autonomy, health, and well-being. The most updated research has investigated the associations between the action responsiveness of older adults and the maintenance of their physiological and physical health or the development of mental and physical health problems. Once autonomic dysfunction may significantly influence the development of different age-related diseases, including ischemic stroke, cardiovascular disease, and autoimmune diseases, this review aimed to assess the relationship between aging and autonomic functions. The review explored how motivational responses, physiological reactivity, cognitive processes, and lifelong developmental changes associated with aging impact the ANS and contribute to the emergence of health problems.

A sensitive and simple microextraction approach was developed and validated to simultaneously determine three antiarrhythmic drugs, propranolol, diltiazem, and verapamil, in human urine and plasma samples, by combining solvent bar microextraction (SBME) with high-performance-liquid- chromatography diode-array detection. The optimization of SBME was initially investigated following a full factorial design (FFD) and subsequently by central composite design (CCD). With only 27 extraction tests using CCD, the optimum extraction conditions for selected drugs by SBME methodology were determined. The CCD allowed examining the linear, interaction, and quadratic influence of factors on drugs’ extraction efficiencies% (EE%), resulting in reduced size of SBME experiments. Under the optimal conditions, the calibration curves were linear in the ranges of 1.73–103 / 2.56–103 μg L−1 for propranolol, 2.32–103/ 2.83–103 μg L−1 for diltiazem, and 4.54–103/ 5.97–103 μg L−1 for verapamil at the respective urine/ plasma samples with reasonable linearity R2 > 0.978 in both matrixes. The ranged value of intra precision (RSD%, n = 5) for the selected drugs were from 1.30 to 5.66 and from 3.00 to 7.80 in urine and plasma samples, respectively. The limits of detection in urine/ plasma were 0.52/ 0.77 μg L−1, 0.69/ 0.84 μg L−1, 1.36/ 1.79 μg L−1 for propranolol, diltiazem, and verapamil, respectively. In comparison with referenced methods and based on the satisfactory results of applications, the proposed method can be considered a potential method for biopharmaceutical analysis of selected antiarrhythmic drugs in biological samples.