Quick, what’s your biggest worry about getting old?
- Outliving your retirement money.
- Moving into a retirement home.
- Losing your independence.
- Contracting Alzheimer’s.
If you’re like most people, you dread contracting Alzheimer’s the most. Who wants to lose their mental faculties? Who wants their diaper changed by their spouse, partner, friend, child, or total stranger? There’s no way around it, it totally sucks.
Dementia has an Ugly Trend line
The good news is we’re all living longer. The bad news is we’re all living longer. It’s only bad because it means more of us will enter the high probability years of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. Age is the biggest risk factor for dementia. People entering their mid-eighties have a 50% chance of contracting dementia, that’s a flip of a coin.
It is estimated by the National Institute of Health that by the year 2050 cases of Alzheimer’s will triple from the today’s 5 million cases to 15 million…pretty sobering.
How Alzheimer’s Affects the Brain
We have all these cognitive functions: thinking, remembering, analyzing, etc. To accomplish all this in the brain, signals are transmitted across synapses. The average brain has over 100 trillion synapses. And it’s primarily within these synapses is where Alzheimer’s happens.
There’s a small peptide (a compound consisting of two or more amino acids) called amyloid-B which start to build up between synapses. The amyloid gums up the works and interferes with the signaling. However, they’re usually cleared away and metabolized by microglia, natural cells resident in the brain and spinal cord which clears away unwanted cells.
Of course when we’re young, the machinery works just fine. But as we age we can hit a tipping point. That’s when too much amyloid-B builds up and the microglia gets overwhelmed and can’t keep up with the cleaning process.
Worse, it’s possible for the microglia to also go amuck could actually be eating away at the synapses themselves. Instead of being the savior, it becomes part of the problem.
There can also be a parallel problem caused by tau in the brain. Tau’s normal role is to stabilize internal microtubule transport systems to all parts of the neuron. Sometimes as we age, tau is caused to separate from the microtubules causing them to fall apart. Then strands of tau combine to form tangles which disable the transport system and destroys the cell. Neurons then disconnect from each other and eventually die. This is what causes memory loss. The brain actually shrinks and loses function.
No cure for Alzheimer’s.
As this is written, there is no cure for Alzheimer’s and there’s nothing imminent in the drug pipeline. So, don’t bank on a cure should you be misfortunate enough to contract it, but don’t despair, there are proactive steps you can take beginning today to delay Alzheimer’s onset.
The strategy to Alzheimer’s prevention is to keep that wretched amyloid plaque from reaching that previously mentioned tipping point. So, what’s in your control? Develop good habits for brain health now, it’s never too late.
Another avenue is to stimulate brain growth to replace neuron loss. Throughout our lives we gain new neurons and synapses through the process of “neurogenesis” which declines with age. However, older folks can take positive steps to promote neurogenesis as well as decrease amyloid plaque. We’ll discuss 4 strategies for doing such:
- Exercise
- Fasting
- Intellectual Stimulation
- Nutrition
Exercise for Brain Health
Brain loves oxygen so anything you can do to promote good oxygen flow will foster good brain health. The best way is exercise.
In addition to all the other positive attributes exercise has on your body, there are several ways it helps the brain. It reduces inflammation, and improves neurogenesis (the growth of new brain cells) in the hippocampus. Most compelling evidence is that physical exercise will upregulate brain growth factors. It will secrete BDNF (Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor) that will actually grow your brain. Some scientists refer to BDNF as “miracle grow for the brain”
Exercise also stimulates neurons to respond adaptively by increasing the number of mitochondria. Mitochondria are organelles within all most of our cells that generate the energy for the cell. In the brain, that energy allows more neurons to develop which increases learning and memory.
From studies at UC San Diego, we learn that moderate exercise even in later life reduce risk of cognitive decline. Exercise essentially results in 20% reduction in risk of cognitive impairment. Higher levels of cardiovascular fitness result in even less age related loss in frontal, parietal and temporal lobes. So, crank it up.
But even just walking has been shown to help. Walking is most popular activity with older seniors. Walking increase functional connectivity in brain. Walking has been measured by UCSD to increases average hippocampal volumes in women by 0.2% to 1.4%. Since we lose 1% to 2% per year after the age of 65, it’s a good offset. Never too late to begin – walk at least 4 hours/week.
However, the more you can crank up your aerobic activity, the better. Remember we’re trying to get oxygen to the brain and to trigger an adaptive response by the mitochondria.
Adding strength training to your routine will also improve brain health. Strength training has been shown to improve performance on working memory and executive functioning. There is added benefit to doing both aerobics and strength training.
Supplement Exercise with Everyday Movement
It’s been shown that general daily activity promotes better cognition. Even if you remove purposeful aerobic exercise, just physical movement is also beneficial. So get out there and garden, rake leaves, clean house, walk up stairs, whatever, and just move. You’ll be smarter for it.
Fasting for Brain Health
We’ll talk about beneficial nutrition for brain health later, but paradoxically non-eating is also beneficial for brain health. Fasting reduces inflammation and oxidative stress.
With every meal you eat, energy is stored in the liver and muscles as glycogen. Glycogen is quickly converted to glucose as the body requires it. The glucose triggers insulin to allow cells to absorb it.
The brain is a glucose hog, pound per pound it the greatest user of glucose. As we eat 3 meals a day the brain is never at a want for glucose, consequently it’s never challenged to stimulate growth, times are good.
But, should that steady flow of glucose to the brain be interrupted, it will trigger an adaptive response where the brain is stimulated into neurogenesis. This can be achieved through regular fasting.
When you fast, the glycogen stores are tapped into first until they’re all depleted. Then the body switches to burning body fat to keep feeding the brain, but now instead of glucose, through a conversion process feeding the brain beneficial ketone bodies.
This process challenges the brain and it responds with “adaptive stress response pathways” to help it cope with stress and resist disease. This is a product of thousands of years of evolution for us to survive during periods of famine.
As with exercise, fasting stimulate the production of neurotrophic factors such as BDNF and FGF to promote the growth of new axons and dendrites, the formation and strengthening of synapses and the production of new neurons from stem cells. Additionally it increases the number of beneficial mitochondria in your nerve cells.
More info on fasting for brain health:
By the way, being overweight is a higher risk factor for Alzheimer’s Fasting will also help to keep your weight under control so you get a double benefit.
Intellectual Stimulation for Brain Health.
Whenever we stimulate the brain through intellectual challenges, we are creating and strengthening neural connections. When be build enough of these be create what’s called a “cognitive reserve”.
Having a cognitive reserve is having an abundance of neural connections. Even though you lose many connections, say through aging cognitive decline, you will have several more in reserve to still carry on. This can give you bonus years of mental aptitude even with dementia.
Cognitive reserves are built up by intellectual stimulation, in particular by learning new things that will pave new neural networks.
It’s not about merely doing crossword puzzles or Sudoku, those merely sharpen a skill you’ve already learned, it needs to be rich across all senses and emotions. The gold standard would be to learn a new language and travel to that country and practice using it.
Lifelong learning protects the brain. So, make a commitment to learn, educate, and train and it will keep you sharp.
Nutrition for Brain Health
Finally there are certain foods you can eat that will also promote better brain health.
Eating for a healthy microbiome will get you there as well, read more:
You’re Really Not Healthy Unless You Also Have a Healthy Gut — Here’s How
Assuming you’re eating a balanced diet anyway here are some menu tweaks for better brain health.
Do:
- Eat flavonoids. Inflammation and oxidative stress play a role in the pathology
pomegranate has been shown to improve cognition over a placebo, the juice is a tasty way to keep your mind sharp. of Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s. Various properties of flavonoids, including their role in protecting vascular health have beneficial effects on the brain,
- Eat omega 3 fats. These are the beneficial fats in fish and nuts since your brain is also 70% fat.
- Eat blueberries. Blueberries are a powerful antioxidant for overall good health, a 2016 study found that blueberries can treat patients who already show signs of mental impairment.
- Eat foods high in folic acid like leafy green vegetables, they’re shown to reduce inflammation which aids in brain health.
- Add curcumin to your diet. Found in turmeric, it correlates to better brain health.
- Drink pomegranate juice. Clinical trials have shown increased cognition by subjects taking regular doses of pomegranate juice over those taking a placebo.
- Ginkgo Biloba supplementation will help increase blood flow to the brain.
- Drink green tea; the combined influence of both caffeine and l-theanine have been shown to improve cognition.
In contrast there are food sources you should shun for better brain health.
Don’t consume:
- Refined sugars
- Saturated Fats
- Processed Foods
- Too much alcohol – A little red wine has resveratrol which neutralizes the negative effects somewhat.
- Too much caffeine – A little green tea is beneficial
Brain Health Bonus Points:
In addition to the 4 strategies for promotion better brain health and staving off
Alzheimer’s, here are some additional steps for a healthier brain:
- Sleep is a “power cleanse” for the brain. Sleep deprivation increases amyloid-B, so get plenty of sleep.
- Treat depression. Patients with depression have lower levels of neurogenesis.
Read about self-help for depression:
Natural Ways to Combat Depression
- Manage stress. Chronic stress can lead to depression.
- Meditation – a great way to manage stress.
- Walk with friends. If you walk for exercise, then walk with a friend and talk openly about feelings, you get a double whammy in brain health.
- Treat hypertension and cholesterol, they both have negative effects on brain health.
- Use your fitness watch and get your 10,000 steps in each and every day. Keep moving.
- Address heart disease early – 80% of Alzheimer’s patients have heart disease.
Employing these four strategies plus all the bonus points may not stop you from forgetting where you put your keys, but it will stop you from unknowingly placing them in the refrigerator.