Highly Educated Individuals with AlzheimerÛªs Can Cope Better with the Disease
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| Be a smarty pants. |
From the Assisted Living Federation of America:
A new study has found that highly educated individuals with AlzheimerÛªs can cope better with the disease thanks to cognitive reserves presumably built up from years of performing complex intellectual activities.
Scientists have long theorized that the human brain is capable of building up a cognitive reserve, which would help the brain cope with damage in order to maintain a relatively preserved functional level.åÊ
In order to understand the efficacy of these cognitive reserves, researchers looked at the brain activity of individuals with higher (more than 12 years) and lower (less than 12 years) levels of education who had mild cognitive impairment that progressed to Alzheimer’s disease.
The study included 64 individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and 90 individuals with no cognitive problems to compare as a control group. After being divided into two groups based on education level, all participants were given PET scans to compare their metabolic brain activity.åÊ
The highest metabolic activity was seen in highly educated individuals with Alzheimer’s disease. This activity rate was higher than both the less educated individuals with Alzheimer’s and even the highly educated control individuals.åÊ
The results of the scans suggested that neural reserves and neural compensation are activated in highly educated individuals with Alzheimer’s disease.åÊ
“This work supports the notion that employing the brain in complex tasks and developing our own education may help in forming stronger ‘defenses’ against cognitive deterioration once AlzheimerÛªs knocks at our door,” said Silvia Morbelli, MD, lead author of the study.åÊ
So keep on challenging your brain and build the elasticity that may help you if beset by Alzheimer’s Disease.
Being American Is Bad for Your Health (VIDEO)
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Hearing Loss Associated With Hospitalization
ÛÏHearing loss (HL) is a chronic condition that affects nearly 2 of every 3 adults aged 70 years or older in the United States. Hearing loss has broader implications for older adults, being independently associated with poorer cognitive and physical functioning. The association of HL with other health economic outcomes, such as health care use, is unstudied,Û writes Dane J. Genther, M.D., of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, and colleagues, in a Research Letter in JAMA.åÊ
The authors investigated the association of HL with hospitalization and burden of disease in a nationally representative study of adults 70 years of age or older.
The researchers analyzed combined data from the 2005-2006 and 2009-2010 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), an ongoing epidemiological study designed to assess the health and functional status of the civilian, non-institutionalized U.S. population.
The authors found that compared with individuals with normal hearing, individuals with HL were more likely to have a positive history for cardiovascular risk factors, have a history of hospitalization in the past year (18.7 percent vs. 23.8 percent), and have more hospitalizations (1.27 vs. 1.52).åÊ
ÛÏHL was significantly associated with any hospitalization, number of hospitalizations, more than 10 days of self-reported poor physical health, and more than 10 days of self-reported poor mental health,Û the researchers write.
Additional research is needed they concluded.
If you play this out logically it makes sense right. If you cannot hear, you can miss all types of instructions, not care for yourself properly and therefore get in trouble.
Have your hearing checked.
Better yet, if you have hearing loss, do not be embarrassed by the prospect of getting hearing aides. Not naming names (my father-in-law) definitely has hearing loss but will not at all entertain getting them. Swallow your pride.
Vegetarian Diets Associated With Lower Risk of Death
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| @Veria |
Vegetarian diets are associated with reduced death rates in a study of more than 70,000 with more favorable results for men than women, according to a report published byåÊJAMA Internal Medicine.
Your Cholesterol Drug Could Be Hurting You
I paid attention to this one as I use Crestor once a day.
