Changes You Can Make Now To Lower The Risk Of Dementia And Alzheimer’s Disease

This is a writeup of a study (“Changes You Can Make Now To Lower The Risk of Dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease”) recently published in the Daily Telegraph of Sydney, Australia.  This article is based on the 2020 Study by the prestigious medical journal The Lancet, which identified 12 main risk factors for the disease.  The Lancet study found lifestyle modifications could reduce a person’s chance of dementia by about 40 per cent.

The Lancet study also highlighted risk factors including high blood pressure, hearing impairment, smoking, obesity, depression, physical inactivity and diabetes. Less education early in life and low social contact can also contribute, along with excessive alcohol consumption, traumatic brain injury, and air pollution.

Based on the 2020 Lancet Study, these simple lifestyle changes can help reduce your chance of developing dementia by up to 40 per cent. See the latest advice from health experts.

How To Modify Your Risk
Aerobic Exercise

Elderly people who do even just a small amount of exercise have greater brain functionality than those who don’t.

University of Southern California research found aerobic exercise — brisk walking, swimming, running, or cycling — boosted elderly adults’ cognitive function by three times more than older people who did a combination of aerobic exercise and strengthening exercises.

Conversely, a University of Sydney Brain and Mind Centre study found six months of strength training slowed, and even halted, the degeneration in the brain. Participants in the study did 45 minutes of strength training using dumbbells, weights or machines twice a week for six months. People in the control group who did not do weight training saw the hippocampus area in their brain shrink by 3 to 4 per cent.

Professor Henry Brodaty, from University NSW Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, has just run a trial involving 6000 people and said high intensity exercise that raised the heart rate seemed to be better for maintaining brain functionality.

He is about to start analyzing the data.

The World Health Organisation recommends 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic exercise every week, or 75 weekly minutes of vigorous-intensity aerobic exercise, to keep dementia at bay.

Mediterranean Diet
Dementia  Australia’s Professor Michael Woodward recommends a Mediterranean diet that includes whole grains, fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, olive oil, fish and very small amounts of meat helps prevent the condition.

Alzheimer’s expert Professor Ralph Martin, from Sydney’s Macquarie University, agrees a Mediterranean-style diet can help fight cognitive decline.

Oily fish like salmon are is rich in omega-3 fatty acids, which is often found lacking in the brains of people with Alzheimer’s disease.

Berries, like strawberries blueberries, raspberries and blackberries and green vegetables and beetroot are high in antioxidants and help reduce inflammation.

Blood pressure
The Lancet study said people aged 40 and over should aim for systolic blood pressure of 130 or lower to delay or prevent dementia.

The Australian National University’s Centre for Research on Ageing found blood pressure at a “normal” reading of 120/80 is too high and could be damaging your brain.

The optimum blood pressure for a healthy brain is actually much lower — 110/70.

The journal found people who had higher blood pressure readings of 135/85, which is still within the normal range, had brains that scans showed were six months older than people who had readings in the optimum range.

This put them at risk not just of a less healthy brain but at increased risk of heart disease, stroke and dementia.

Smoking
Don’t smoke. Smoking increases the risk of strokes or bleeding in the brain, which can be precursors to dementia.

Get a hearing aid
Using hearing aids appears to reduce the excess risk of cognitive decline from hearing loss.

Alcohol
Excessive alcohol consumption can lead to brain damage and it may also cause a rare type of dementia called Korsakoff syndrome. Drinking more than two bottles of wine a week increases the risk of dementia.

Obesity
Excess body fat increases inflammation and some research suggests it might contribute to the build-up of damaging proteins in the brain.

Social interaction
Stay socially active
According to the University NSW Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, research shows the number of people a person interacts frequently is associated with greater short-term memory capacity. Research by Prof. Brodaty, Dr Nicole Kochan and Professor Perminder Sachdev found that people who had fewer than five regular face-to-face contacts per month scored lower in tests of attention, processing speed and language than people who had 11 or more face-to-face contacts.

Brain training
Professor Michael Valenzuela at the University of Sydney’s research department shows that brain training — even something as simple as doing a puzzle — can lead to improved cognition.   However, the training must work multiple functions of the brain including visual, verbal and working memory, and it should be structured. Experts recommend online brain training products like CogniFit and Neuronation.

What Is Your Risk of Developing Dementia?
The prevalence of dementia doubles every five years after the age of 60. The risk is around two per cent at age 60 to 64 but grows to 20 per cent by age 80 and 30 per cent by age 90.

Is It Alzheimer’s Or Just Forgetfulness?
It’s normal to forget where your keys are, or, after a big night out, forget where you parked your car but that’s not necessarily due to Alzheimer’s.

According to Prof. Woodward of  Dementia  Australia, “Alzheimer’s is where a person is having progressively greater and wider range of memory symptoms. They can’t remember whether they turned the light off or can’t remember what they said to their partner yesterday”.

“People around them may notice they’re repeating what they’ve just said. They forget who the characters are on a TV show they’re watching or forget that they watched it. They might get lost when they’re driving, even  when driving to familiar places.   Where you’ve got a range of significant memory problems, that’s the time to go and speak to your GP.”

How Is Dementia Diagnosed
Only about 30 per cent of people who have Alzheimer’s are formally diagnosed.

From November, Medicare began paying for a glucose PET scan to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease.

An amyloid PET scan that visualizes plaques present in the brain, which are prime suspects in damaging and killing nerve cells in Alzheimer’s, is also used to diagnose the condition.

Cognitive tests including the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MOCA), the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) test and the CogAT test are used by doctors. A poor score on any one of these tests should lead the GP to refer the patient to an appropriate specialist or memory clinic.

What Happens After Diagnosis
Group cognitive stimulation therapy has been found to have the same positive effect as the drugs used for Alzheimer’s disease.

People with the condition can access assistance dogs to help them with tasks like finding objects and keeping them calm in public.

Cognitive rehabilitation helps people stay independent at home.

Occupational therapists can do home visits and work out strategies to compensate for the deficits such as how to get dressed or do up buttons (substitute velcro).

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We hope you have enjoyed our blog on “Changes You Can Make Now To Lower The Risk Of Dementia And Alzheimer’s Disease”.   Please get back to us with comments if you learned something, or tried some of the ideas and were happy with the results.

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