The New York Times

FEELING a little less mentally quick than you did a few years ago? Maybe you are among the many people who do “brain exercises” like sudoku to slow the cognitive decline associated with aging. We’ve got a better suggestion.

Computer programs to improve brain performance are a booming business. In the United States, consumers are expected to spend $80 million this year on brain exercise products, up from $2 million in 2005. Advertising for these products often emphasizes the claim that they are designed by scientists or based on scientific research. To be charitable, we might call them inspired by science — not to be confused with actually proven by science...

...One form of training, however, has been shown to maintain and improve brain health — physical exercise. In humans, exercise improves what scientists call “executive function,” the set of abilities that allows you to select behavior that’s appropriate to the situation, inhibit inappropriate behavior and focus on the job at hand in spite of distractions. Executive function includes basic functions like processing speed, response speed and working memory, the type used to remember a house number while walking from the car to a party...

...Exercise is also strongly associated with a reduced risk of dementia late in life. People who exercise regularly in middle age are one-third as likely to get Alzheimer’s disease in their 70s as those who did not exercise. Even people who begin exercising in their 60s have their risk reduced by half.

Read the entire article.

NOTE: If you're a regular reader of this blog, you know that we've long promoted physical exercise as one of the best things you can do for your brain. Jack himself (81 years old) is proof-positive. He showed tremendous improvement in memory and impulse control after getting back into tennis and playing regularly several times a week. Within a year's time, Jack's friends began to notice the difference. Nothing short of amazing. Please, please get up and move. Walk, ride a stationary bike, play tennis, swim, dance, whatever. Just get that body moving. Brain improvement will follow.

Labels: alzheimer's, brain exercises, TBI, traumatic brain injury

Verbal memory refers to memory of words and verbal items. Since we process most verbal information with the left side of our brain, damage to that side of the brain can impair verbal memory and even the ability to talk and understand speech.

The California Verbal Learning Test is one way to assess verbal memory. The tester reads aloud “Monday’s shopping list,” which is a list containing sixteen items, each belonging to one of four categories. So there might be four fruits, four vegetables, four spices, etc. The person being tested then tries to remember as many items as possible.

The tester will repeat this exercise several times, making note of how many items the person being tested remembers, and also whether he is using the categories. For example, if the test subject remembers only three vegetables but guesses that the remaining item is a vegetable, then he probably understands categories. If he guesses something entirely different, like chocolate syrup, then he probably doesn’t understand the categories.

Sometimes a tester will read from a second list, “Tuesday’s shopping list,” to see if the person can keep items from the two lists separate, or if he confuses the lists. Then, for 20 minutes or so, the tester distracts the person by giving him other things to do, and then asks him to try to remember Monday’s list.

Women often perform better on this test, especially with the categories. And, according to Memory Loss and the Brain , “patients with different kinds of brain damage or disorder also show reliable patterns of performance. For example, patients with Alzheimer's Disease tend to be unable to make use of category information (and might recall: Apples, Bananas, Oranges, Chicken) while patients with Parkinson's Disease tend to make repetition errors (for example: Apples, Bananas, Oranges, Bananas).”

One other thing to consider is that some people naturally process information differently than others -- verbally (with words) versus visually (with pictures). A person who tends to think visually may not do well on a verbal memory test, and vice versa. Comprehensive memory tests will consider both types of memory to get a more thorough assessment of a person’s ability to remember.

Labels: alzheimer's, California Verbal Learning Test, neuropsych tests, Parkinson disease, TBI, traumatic brain injury

One of the most common genetic defects passed on through families significantly increases a person's chance of having a stroke, according to a study published in the Neurology, March 27, 2007.

"This type of gene has previously been associated with brain diseases such as Alzheimer disease, Parkinson disease, ALS, multiple sclerosis, and cerebrovascular disease, but this is the first time we've been able to determine this gene predicts such a significant increased risk of stroke," said study author Borge G. Nordestgaard, MD, DMSc, with Herlev University Hospital in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Read the article.

Labels: alzheimer's, Parkinson disease, stroke

From Reuters:

New evidence shows that the human brain can manufacture fresh brain cells, researchers said, in a study that may lead to better ways to treat brain damage and disease.

"This study is exciting because it reveals a group of brain cells in the adult human brain that are continuously regenerating," said Dr. Mark Baxter of Britain's Oxford University.

Another expert, Sebastian Brandner, head of the Division of Neuropathology at the Institute of Neurology at University College London, said, "These findings are important for several reasons: Understanding stem cell biology is essential to study brain repair in neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and it is even possible that stem cells are the source of some brain tumors."

Read entire article.

Labels: alzheimer's, brain, stem cells

Reuters reports that "Elderly people who report being lonely are more than twice as likely to develop Alzheimer's disease as people who are not lonely, new research indicates."

Social isolation in old age -- being single, having few friends, and participating in few activities with others -- has been associated with risk of developing dementia, Dr. Robert S. Wilson, from Rush University Medical Center, Chicago, and colleagues explain in the Archives of General Psychiatry.

"'Loneliness was associated with lower cognitive function at the start of the study and with more rapid cognitive decline during the study,' the authors report." You can find the entire article here.

Labels: alzheimer's, dementia, loneliness