Full Transcript Introduction to Alzheimeru2019s Prevention 0:03 Great. 0:07 Good. 0:09 Well, having this talk tonight and in November is apropos for a number of reasons, which I'll be getting to later on in the presentation. 0:20 There's a lot that we can do to prevent Alzheimer's, and Alzheimer is certainly one of the main things that's on the minds of people as we get older. 0:30 It is a worldwide problem and there's a lot that we can do to prevent it. 0:38 So I want to share with you some of the things that I've learned as a result of having training with Dr. 0:44 Dale Bredesen on preventing and stabilizing and in some cases, reversing cognitive decline. 0:52 the things that I've learned over the course of treating neuropathic pain conditions that also have to do with many of the same things when we address cognition. 1:05 So with that, I will start my slides going. 1:10 Let's see. 1:10 I'm going to screen share here and show you my slide. 1:22 Like I said, this is Alzheimer's Awareness Month in November, and so we thought it would be good to take the opportunity to talk about Alzheimer and Alzheimer prevention. 1:35 Most of you I saw who entered and most of, you know, who I am and what I do, but for anybody who's new, I just want to talk to you a little bit about what 1:44 restorative and functional medicine is because it's really a different approach. 1:48 And I think it is getting more widespread, more doctors who practice conventional medicine are getting aware of it. 1:56 Some people are even interested in open to doing things differently, more like what we do. 2:05 So it's a pioneering field. 2:07 It's only really come around, some parts of it are quite old and are based in things like traditional Chinese medicine and thousands year old medical systems 2:19 and health systems. 2:21 But a lot of is new within the last 20, 30 years. 2:25 It's scientifically based. 2:27 We try as much as possible to implement treatments that have scientific studies to back them up. 2:36 Since a lot we're dealing with natural products and there are not billions of dollars behind it for development and testing, 2:43 a lotta times there aren't large studies. 2:46 And so we use basic science and we used the studies that we have available. 2:53 The approach includes lifestyle medicine, lifestyle changes, and natural solutions. 3:00 And I'm not opposed to using pharmaceuticals, but a lot of times pharmaceutical's either don't work as well or have a lotta side effects. 3:09 So we try to use the best thing for the situation with the least side-effects. 3:15 Functional medicine also looks at the whole person. 3:18 So when we're talking about cognition, we can't just be talking what happens from the neck up. 3:25 Alzheimer's and cognitive decline is a body-wide illness. 3:28 There are many things in the rest of your body that contribute to what's going on in your brain. 3:34 So functional medicine really unites the different parts of our body, the difference systems in our bodies. 3:40 We don't have somebody who just looks at the brain and somebody just who looks the gut, although there are specialists in those areas. 3:49 Were always learning more and more about the connections between the different organ systems. 3:58 We're always trying to find the root cause of things. 4:00 When I went to medical school, nobody talked about what caused disease for the most part. 4:05 It just seemed like disease just happened to people. 4:09 Nobody talked why. 4:10 I didn't have any idea why until I got into this field of medicine. 4:15 And I'll talk to you about some of the roots causes are because when you know the real causes, you can either prevent it or treat it more effectively. 4:25 And this ends up being a deeper, more lasting approach. 4:40 We also look at a lot of different things. 4:42 So, conventional medicine, a, lot is looking at genetics now didn't always. 4:48 because how we process what comes into our bodies, the physiologic and chemical steps that take place in our body, significantly are governed by our genetics.
Functional Medicine Approach 4:58 What we know is that probably 20% of what goes on is genetic, but 80%, which is the bulk of it, is everything else that happens. 5:10 All of the lifestyle factors, the environmental factors the stress factors and so even if our genetics are quote programmed a certain way there is a tremendous 5:23 amount that we can do with our genetic to change how that genetics actually expresses itself. 5:28 And that field is getting to be understood more and more, and it's called epigenetics. 5:33 So you may have the DNA. 5:34 I have DNA for diabetes. 5:36 My mother was a diabetic. 5:38 Her sister, who she was very close to, was diabetic, they were bad diabetics. 5:43 They died of complications of their diabetes and I probably have the genetics, but my lifestyle is a lot different and my weight's a different, 5:53 my diet's different. 5:56 And so I know that I have that risk and I need to work on it, it doesn't come easy. 6:01 But I've managed to not become a diabetic, even though I had this really strong family history. 6:08 So you can see that regardless of your genetics there is lot that you could do to have things have a difference outcome. 6:19 Conventional medicine a lot does not look at environmental factors, does look not at environment toxins, which we'll talk about in terms of Alzheimer's. 6:27 And except for a few doctors, gastroenterologists who know stress affects the GI tract, A lot of doctors do not understand the role of stress in our physiology. 6:39 And it's not just like you're stressed and you are worked up about something. 6:43 It's like when that happens, there are chemical steps that happen in your body that lead to lowered immunity and increased risk of chronic illness. 6:52 So stress plays a biochemical role, not an emotional and mental role. 7:03 So when I first got into functional medicine, I called it anti-aging medicine. 7:08 It was 14 years ago. 7:10 I was mainly working with perimenopausal and menopause of women who were having problems with hormone decline. 7:17 And so the things that were the most common issues that women came to me with was fatigue, emotional changes of peri-menopase and Menopas, 7:27 low libido, weight problems, Then as things progressed, women said, my husband's got a problem, who can he see? 7:41 We've started taking men at the Sklar Center. 7:44 We had men as patients for many years now. 7:47 Then I realized I couldn't help everybody just by balancing their hormones. 7:52 There were other things that needed to be attended to, gastrointestinal issues, autoimmune disorders, We have patients with very complex and puzzling chronic 8:05 illnesses due to Lyme, mold exposures, multiple viral reactivations, heavy metals exposure and toxicity. 8:14 Things got a lot more complicated as the years went on and I've been on a path to learning as much as I can. 8:22 And in 2015, I met Dr. 8:25 Dale Bredesen at a conference and had read his really landmark paper on I think it was 10 patients, nine of whom he reversed or stabilized their cognitive 8:38 decline and pestered him until I got into his first training session, which was in Northern California. 8:49 So this is how we like to look at things in functional medicine. 8:53 You know, when you see a tree growing, you'll see the trunk, the branches, and the leaves. 8:59 So those are the things that are obvious. 9:01 And in medicine, those things are obviously cancer, autoimmune disorders, diabetes, thyroid problems, depression, Alzheimer's. 9:11 But what is underlying that? 9:14 What's underground? 9:15 what's at the root? 9:17 And these are all the things, not all of them, but many of that we end up looking at when we're trying to figure out why somebody's not functioning optimally. 9:28 So we know that inflammation, which you can think of as a fire burning inside your body, causes a lot of chronic illness. 9:37 So inflammation and the chemicals that get released due to inflammation are damaging to lots of parts of our bodies, our brain included. 9:47 We're all aware of it in terms of joint inflammation, we get joint pain if our joints are inflamed. 9:53 If we're having digestive problems, chances are our gut is inflames. 9:58 Hormone imbalances are at the root of why a lotta people don't feel good. 10:05 toxic environment, toxic relationships, poor diet, nutrient deficiencies. 10:12 These are all things that can be the root cause of chronic illnesses. 10:18 And we look at all of them when we're addressing somebody with cognition problems. 10:26 The conventional view of Alzheimer's, and we've seen this when request patients medical records, First of all, it's difficult to admit that you're having 10:37 a cognitive problem. 10:38 That you don't remember things. 10:41 You're embarrassed because you are forgetting things, your brain is not working right, not processing properly. 10:47 So the first thing that happens is people delay seeking help because they don t want to believe it is happening, they do not want acknowledge it s happening. 10:56 They hope it will go away. 10:58 And when somebody does end up going to their doctor because they think they have a problem, frequently doctors don't refer the patient. 11:10 They will do some kind of a mental status exam, say it looks pretty good, come back in six months or a year, because if they don' have anything that they 11:19 can recommend to help you, and you come in back a new year and then they document, oh yeah, you've gone downhill last time. 11:28 So we'll send you to the neurologist and the Neurologist does some evaluations and says the up you know you're impaired.
Alzheimeru2019s Statistics and Conventional Treatment Limits 11:35 Maybe tries a medication a lot those medications don't do much and then says i'll see you back in six months and another six. 11:43 And another 6 months, and we have gotten the records of patients who. 11:50 have gone through this process where every six months their cognitive decline gets documented, but nobody really does much to help them out. 12:04 I think the Alzheimer's Association has changed their advertising, but in 2016, they said Alzheimer's is the only cause of death in the top 10 in America 12:17 that cannot be prevented, cured or slowed. 12:20 I think at this point, the Alzheimer Association admits that there are definite steps that can be done for prevention. 12:27 And we'll talk about that because they are generally recognized and accepted. 12:33 So these are some of the statistics and the statistic are staggering and overwhelming. 12:40 Every 65 seconds somebody gets diagnosed with Alzheimer's or dementia. 12:45 And dementia is the term for your brain is not working right and you are not able to carry out your daily activities. 12:54 Alzheimer's is a form of dementia. 12:57 There are many different forms of Dementia. 12:59 there's vascular dementia that can happen when you have plaque in the blood vessels to your brain. 13:05 So you're not getting adequate blood flow. 13:06 Um, there is something called Lewy body disease. 13:11 They're a whole variety of different types of dimension, but certainly Alzheimer dementia is the most common. 13:19 Dementia starts in the brain many, many years before symptoms appear. 13:24 And that's why it's so important at the first sign of a problem to seek help. 13:30 Because by the time someone can't remember things anymore, is starting to show on testing that they're in decline, they have lost a lot of nerves in their brain, 13:45 a lotta neurons. 13:48 Alzheimer's is the sixth leading cause of death in the United States. 13:53 And the average financial burden is huge for families who need to have caretakers round the clock or have their loved ones in a facility. 14:05 It's financially draining and it's incredibly emotionally draining. 14:10 And at this point, 46 plus million people are having cognitive problems, and it's expected to double in the next 20 years. 14:23 Six people in US currently have Alzheimer's. 14:27 One in three seniors dies with Alzheimer or other dementia, more than breast and prostate cancer combined. 14:34 If you live to be over 85, congratulations, but you need to really work hard to keep your brain functioning well because one of two people, 14:43 every half of all the people over age 85 have dementia. 14:48 So if you plan to live a long life, you really wanna work on your brand. 14:56 Sometimes this is called the silver tsunami because as we're older, we have silver hair and it's expected to be a giant wave of Alzheimer's disease. 15:08 By 2050, there are expected, like I said, to 20 years to double, but by 2050 14 million people in America will have Alzheimer disease, 15:20 how are we going to take care of them? 15:25 And it turns out women are at the epicenter. 15:31 For reasons that are not totally clear, 65% of Alzheimer's patients are women. 15:37 It may have to do with more longevity in women, and the longer you live, the more likely you are to develop Alzheimer or some kind of dementia. 15:47 And 60% caregivers are woman. 15:54 So what's normally done? 15:55 You go in, you say your brain's not working like it used to and the doctor says, prove it to me and they give you a test and maybe you don't do so good 16:07 on the test. 16:08 And then they say, well, we're gonna give a prescription. 16:12 Over the last, I don' know how many years, 20, 30 years there have been 246 drugs tested, six approved, One showed some benefit, 16:23 although it was marginal benefit. 16:27 Most recently, a drug called Adulhelm has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. 16:35 And you may have read something about this. 16:38 There was a committee of neurologists who did not pass on this drug because they thought it wasn't effective. 16:46 But the FDA approved it anyway. 16:50 And there are a few problems with this drug. 16:54 I'm gonna run through the list of what I have on the slide, but I'll update you on what, I just happened to read right before this talk. 17:04 So what Adelhelm does is remove amyloid. 17:06 And you might've heard of amyloid. 17:08 Amyloids is a sticky protein. 17:11 All of us have it to some extent in our brains. 17:13 It seems that people with Alzheimer's have more of it. 17:18 What has been shown over and over again with pharmaceuticals is that removing the amyloid does not improve cognition. 17:29 And for some reason, the pharmaceutical companies don't seem to understand that. 17:34 This drug, Adelhelm, was found to remove amlyloids. 17:40 One study showed people had some mild improvement in their cognition, two other studies showed no improvement. 17:48 And what we know about amyloid, the reason our brains make amlyloids is it's an antibacterial. 17:57 It's like a natural antibiotic. 18:00 And a lot of Alzheimer's disease we think is caused by viral infections that have gotten into our brain. 18:07 have crossed the blood-brain barrier, and our brain is trying to kill bacteria and viruses and produces amyloid to do it. 18:16 So amlyloids not the cause. 18:19 Amyloide is a result of our bodies trying fight an infection in our brains. 18:27 was only effective in very early stages of cognitive decline. 18:32 The studies had mixed results. 18:33 So one study showed some benefit, two studies showed no benefits. 18:37 Did not seem to slow the progression of decline, and what we do know is Alzheimer's seemed to have this inexorable march toward decline and getting worse. 18:51 It has some very significant side effects, in 40% of the people that use it. 18:57 brain swelling and inflammation, which can be serious and require hospitalization and bleeding into the brain. 19:06 Not minor. 19:08 It's given as a monthly infusion and it's priced at $56,000 per infusio. 19:16 And what's happened, and I've got a typo here, it should say will cause everyone's Medicare rates to increase. 19:25 There was a report in the LA Times that Medicare Part B is going to have a 15% increase starting next year. 19:35 Half of that increase, or 7.5%, was directly linked with this medication, and they anticipated widespread use of it. 19:46 What's since happened and what I read right before our talk is that there were phase three trials, which is the last stage of testing a medication for 19:56 effectiveness before it goes to market. 19:58 And the, the two drug companies that were holding the phase three trials, just abandoned them for what's called futility, 20:08 meaning the drug is futile. 20:11 It's not doing anything. 20:14 So the company stock just plummeted. 20:17 Some other company is coming in with another similar drug to see if they can like snow all the FDA and everybody into approving that one. 20:26 And so that's the status of pharmaceuticals. 20:30 and Alzheimer's, I'm gonna show you some things that really do prevent Alzheimer disease that need to be part of public health efforts. 20:40 So the billions of dollars that drug companies are putting into drug development really need be directed elsewhere. 20:50 Our approach to Alzheimer's and any cognitive decline is again, to look at root cause analysis. 20:56 Does someone have heavy metal toxicity? 20:58 We had a patient with very high mercury.
Root Causes and Public Health Prevention 21:01 It had caused a lot of cardiovascular disease and cognition problems. 21:07 And we were able to treat him for his mercury toxicity and as well as doing other things and improve cognition. 21:14 There are genetic factors. 21:16 So there are genes that predispose people to Alzheimer's disease, the APOE4 gene. 21:25 And people who have one copy of it, who along with the one APoE for gene have AP0e3 or APoe2, are probably at about 15% increased risk of Alzheimer. 21:38 Some people have APOE-4, two copies of it, which really can significantly increase risk of Alzheimer's. 21:47 For those people, and increased risk for cardiovascular disease, those are the people that really need to work on lifestyle, 21:56 hormone optimization, elimination of toxins, everything they can do to optimize their brain function and remove all possible things that can impair it. 22:08 We have biochemical individuality, which is partly determined by our genetics, how we process things, How much B vitamins do we need? 22:18 How well do detoxify hormones, toxins and other things? 22:23 Lifestyle factors that we'll get into. 22:26 environmental factors we'll also get into and like I said, the role of stress. 22:30 So the same things that we do throughout functional medicine for anything that somebody comes to us about, we also do in our approach to Alzheimer's. 22:42 A new view of Alzheimer is that it's definitely preventable. 22:48 It can be stabilized and we have had a number of patients who have remained stable and not declined at least. 22:56 and possibly reversible. 22:58 Some doctors working in this field have actually been able to significantly reverse cognitive decline. 23:04 And we did in one patient who had significant mercury toxicity. 23:10 Like I mentioned about amyloid, it's a protective response to bacteria and viruses. 23:18 So no point trying to get rid of it. 23:20 That doesn't make people better. 23:24 Also, we know that Alzheimer's is caused by, among other things, metabolic and toxic damage. 23:30 What does that mean? 23:32 Blood sugar. 23:34 You don't have to be a diabetic, but if your blood sugar is higher than it should be, you are putting your brain at risk. 23:41 Toxic damage comes in many, many forms, from biotoxins like mold, to inorganic toxins like metals, air pollution, which increases Alzheimer's. 23:58 And like I said, the main thing is to address things as early as possible. 24:04 Like I've said before, it's not a brain problem. 24:08 It's a whole body problem So I mentioned public health initiatives. 24:16 If we took the billions of dollars that were put into Alzheimer's drug development and put it in to the things that I've listed here that could prevent 50% 24:27 of Alzheimer. 24:30 What a win that would be. 24:32 So people with higher education have less Alzheimer's. 24:37 They have what's called greater cognitive reserve. 24:41 It's like you've got more money in the bank. 24:43 If you start to lose a few pennies, you still got a lot of money to work with. 24:47 The same thing happens with brain power. 24:50 A good education, higher-education, lifelong learning, all of that's really important. 24:57 Smoking, I would say, for the most part, there have been great public health efforts against smoking. 25:02 So smoking, except in a few pockets here and there in the US, is a lot. 25:08 People know that it's something they should not do, that's not good for them, and it causes lung cancer, causes Alzheimer's as well. 25:16 Physical inactivity, not moving your body, no exercising, as a risk factor. 25:23 And we'll talk about why later. 25:26 Obesity is a risk factor. 25:29 The more body fat you have, the smaller your brain. 25:33 So it increases your risk of cognitive decline because of brain shrinkage. 25:41 High blood pressure because increased risk plaque and arterial disease so you're not getting the oxygen and blood flow to your brains that it needs. 25:51 Diabetes, like I mentioned, sugar is toxic to your brain. 25:55 So even if you're not a diabetic, you are a pre-diabetic, and you have many times during the day when your blood sugar higher than it should be, 26:04 that excess sugar will attack the nerves and the neurons in your brains and damage them. 26:12 And the other thing we know is that depression seems to be associated with Alzheimer's. 26:17 And I'll show you later a little map of the brain and how the memory center of their brain is very close to the emotional center. 26:26 So we don't know if it's cause and effect of depression cause Alzheimer, but it seems like when one part of that carries memory, 26:38 which is very close to the emotional part of the brain. 26:40 If nerves start getting damaged, they may very well get damaged in both parts at the same time. 26:49 So everybody wants to know, you know like, when should I get worried? 26:52 Like I forgot where I put my keys, like should i get start any worried now? 26:57 So there are certain definite risk factors. 27:00 So if there is dementia in your family, you may carry one of the genes and it's possible to test people to see if you have the APOE4 gene. 27:12 Like I said, if have diabetes, it is very important to get your blood sugars under control. 27:19 People a lot rely on medications, but really lifestyle, which is exercise and diet is the most effective way to do it for most people. 27:31 If you have an inflammatory, a chronic inflammatory disorder like rheumatoid arthritis, that inflammation in your joints also puts you at increased risk 27:41 of brain inflammation and cognition problems. 27:45 A history of cardiovascular disease, which I've mentioned a couple of times, if the blood vessels around your heart have plaque and the flood flow is not 27:54 optimal to your hear muscle, you may be also having a similar process going on in the brain. 28:01 Perimenopausal and menopause of women are at increased risk and having had head injuries. 28:09 And we used to think that somebody had to have a flat-out concussion with loss of consciousness and feeling dizzy and disoriented for days to really be 28:20 a significant traumatic brain injury. 28:23 We now know that much lesser bumps on the head can be additive. 28:28 And each time you get a bad bump on your head, your brain gets inflamed for a while. 28:34 Some of that inflammation may not get turned off. 28:38 episodes, if you have repeated head trauma, those inflammatory episodes are additive. 28:44 And we've certainly seen that in our athletes, boxers, football players. 28:53 So when should you be concerned? 28:56 If you have brain fog, it doesn't mean you're getting Alzheimer's, but it can indicate that your brain is inflamed. 29:03 And we see lots of people who with the perimenopause transition start having brainfog where it just feels like you are slogging through molasses, 29:13 like, you aren't quick and sharp and to the point And so inflammation is a contributor to Alzheimer's. 29:22 Just because you have brain fog doesn't mean you'll have Alzheimer. 29:26 But one of the things that we know with menopause is we lose estrogen and estrogen along with some of our other hormones. 29:35 keep down the inflammatory chemicals. 29:37 And since COVID, everybody knows what cytokines are. 29:41 Before COVID if I had said cytekines, you wouldn't have known what I was talking about. 29:44 But now you know, cytakines our inflammatory chemical. 29:49 In COVID they get very active in the lungs and cause the lung problems, the severe lung problem. 29:55 Well, citakine are all over our bodies. 29:59 Cytokines also are in the brain and can contribute to brain fog.
Warning Signs and Risk Factors 30:06 If you find that you are more forgetful, some people have attention disorders. 30:13 You know, I always joke about my husband. 30:16 I met him when I was 24 and he never could remember where he put his keys, his wallet, and his glasses. 30:22 So he finally actually got better over the years because he figured out a system. 30:26 So, he knew where he put those things. 30:28 Some people have attention issues, but if you're not one of those people and you are now starting to misplace things frequently, 30:35 that can be a warning sign. 30:38 Memory lapses in the middle of a sentence. 30:40 I think we've all gone, now, where was I? 30:44 But the question is, is that happening a lot? 30:48 for getting where you park your car. 30:51 Again, it can be an attention issue. 30:53 Did you pay attention to what floor you, or did you just drive around and around, and up the different levels of the parking structure until you saw a 31:00 space and then walked into the mall and didn't really pay any attention on what you were on? 31:07 If it takes longer to learn new things. 31:11 And if you find you have brain fatigue while you're concentrating, like trying to read a book, follow a movie, or follow up plot on TV, 31:22 that can be a sign of brain inflammation and cognitive difficulties. 31:29 People who have a high state of inflammation in their 20s, rather 30s 40s and 50s are at increased risk of Alzheimer's regardless of what the cause of 31:40 that inflammation is. 31:41 I would say the main point I wanna get across is doctors should not be telling people you're too young to worry. 31:51 We've seen cognitive problems in people starting in their 50s, even earlier sometimes. 31:58 Don't write it off to stress, don't right it up to age or a senior moment. 32:03 If you're having problems at least get evaluated. 32:07 Then you can find out is your brain working okay or should you need to do something about it. 32:13 Here is. 32:19 A picture that I was talking about the emotional part of the brain and the memory part. 32:26 So the amygdala, which is down here at the bottom. 32:29 I don't know if you can see my little arrow. 32:33 This is the fear and emotional center of brain. 32:36 It's inside the break, not on the outside. 32:38 All of this is outside which registers where our arms and legs are, and if we're having pain on one side of our body or the other. 32:46 But here in the center of the brain is the fear and emotional center, the amygdala. 32:51 And it's right next door to this U-shaped structure called the hippocampus. 32:58 Hippo is a Greek word for horse. 33:01 Somebody thought this looked like a seahorse, so they named the structure the Hippocampsus, But you can see why if there is something causing nerve degeneration 33:11 in this area, it very likely could affect the memory center as well as the emotional center. 33:20 Here's what happens to somebody's brain when they have severe Alzheimer's. 33:24 There is severe shrinkage. 33:26 You literally lose tissue, you lose nerves, they degenerate, and they die. 33:31 And then your brain can't function or can function well. 33:37 So we have this wheel of activity of things that need to be addressed to keep your brain healthy. 33:45 Sleep is at the top, then comes stress reduction, your diet, you exercise, what you're doing to train your and keep it active and vibrant, 33:56 removal of toxins from your environment and your hormone and metabolic issues, all of these things play a role in optimal cognition. 34:08 This is how we want people to eat. 34:10 I found this picture and to me, it looks like a Renaissance painting. 34:14 And I think it's beautiful and it has fruits and vegetables and multicolored vegetables. 34:21 It has fish and eggs and sardines, all kinds of things that are good for us. 34:29 So you wanna eat a beautiful rainbow-colored palette of vegetables You do not want to eat these things. 34:39 And when we used to give these talks in person, I would say, you don't want eat like this. 34:45 Some people would go, mm, that looks good to me. 34:50 Unfortunately, the standard American diet, these foods have been promoted. 34:55 These foods had been promoting. 34:57 There have added additives put in them to get us hooked on them. 35:02 What you want do is really fight eating this kind of diet. 35:06 This is carbohydrates, chemicals, lots of sugar. 35:10 I mean, there is some dark chocolate down there. 35:13 That's okay, a little bit of dark, but for the most part, these are calories that do not carry nutrients and nourishment for your body. 35:22 They don't have vitamins, they don' have minerals, They do have antioxidants. 35:28 And so if you eat like this, you're really lacking. 35:33 Then I tell people they're supposed to eat colorful foods and they say, well, these donuts are very colorful. 35:37 But anyhow, These are also full of carbohydrates and sugar. 35:40 So as I said, sugar damages brain tissue and you don't have to be a diabetic to have it cause problems. 35:51 Sugar is inflammatory. 35:53 There are some people who notice that when they eat sugar, their joints hurt more. 35:59 Women with hot flashes sometimes notice their hot flash gets worse. 36:03 That's an inflammatory reaction. 36:06 So sugar is inflammatory and you really want to reduce or eliminate sugar. 36:13 Like I said, diabetics are at increased risk of Alzheimer's disease and This is like the fourth time I've mentioned it, but I'll say it again. 36:22 You don't have to be a diabetic if your blood sugars are not in the optimal range, which is a fasting blood sugar of about 75 to 85 and a hemoglobin A1C 36:33 below 5.7, then you're increasing your risk if you don' do something about that. 36:45 Healthy fats are important and We a lot encourage people to get their fats from vegetable sources. 36:56 Grass-fed beef and dairy are okay because there are a lotta omega-3s in those saturated fats, but there's a lots that you can get from avocados, 37:05 avocado oil, nuts, seeds, coconut, olives, and olive oil. 37:12 Your brain needs fat to function optimally. 37:17 Two thirds of your brain is made of fat. 37:23 And like I said before, lots and lots of vegetables, a beautiful colored array like this. 37:32 Other things you can do. 37:34 So having a 12 hour window, which people are getting more and more aware of intermittent fasting, and there are lots of ways to do it. 37:43 But having 12-hour window between when the last time you eat in the evening and the first time eat the morning allows a number of things to happen. 37:53 It allows your insulin level to go down. 37:55 it allows you body's growth hormone to work better.
Diet, Blood Sugar, and Hormones 38:00 And the other thing is having your supper at least three hours before you go to bed. 38:06 When you eat close to your bedtime, your insulin gets released to help utilize the food that you're eating and metabolize the foods that your eating, 38:14 and insulin interferes with growth hormone. 38:18 Growth hormone is naturally produced by our bodies in the first half of the night that we sleep. 38:25 So if you have a meal close your bed time, You get insulin released to help metabolize all the food that you've just had and insulin interferes with the 38:37 action of growth hormone. 38:38 And so you will not get the full benefit of Growth Hormone. 38:42 What is Growth hormone? 38:44 It's called Growth hormones and people have gotten scared about it. 38:47 They hear about bodybuilders who use it and there have been associations between growing cancer and Growth hormones. 38:55 Growth hormones does not grow cancer. 38:58 Growth hormone should have been called healing hormone. 39:02 It heals your body. 39:08 People, and we use peptides that encourage your bodies to make more growth hormone while you're asleep. 39:15 People's cognition often improves when they're on those peptide. 39:19 So growth hormones helps cognition. 39:22 It helps your physical resilience. 39:24 it helps you build muscle, which then helps reduce body fat, helps utilize carbohydrates that you eat and lowers your blood sugar. 39:33 Growth hormone has a number of different ways that it acts in our bodies. 39:39 I used to make fun of Suzanne Summers before I got into anti-aging medicine and I was like, you know, who's going to take medical advice from Chrissy from 39:47 Three's a Crowd? 39:48 But Suzanne Somers really publicized the issue of menopause and hormones through her books. 39:56 which her original book was one woman's story of what she went through when she through menopause and how she fell apart and learned to feel a lot better 40:05 with the help of doctors who prescribed hormones to her. 40:08 So she has made it well known and I do appreciate the information that she's disseminated. 40:16 And there are safe ways to use hormones. 40:19 People are worried because they've heard about hormones and breast cancer. 40:23 They've heard about testosterone and prostate cancer. 40:27 And there are safe ways to give estrogen and progesterone that mean using bioidentical hormones, which are hormones that are exactly the same chemical 40:39 structure as what your body makes. 40:41 When you do that, there is not an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. 40:46 As a matter of fact, it might be less. 40:48 not an increased risk of breast cancer, and with testosterone, it's really a misnomer that testosterone causes prostate cancer. 40:57 There is not a relationship between testosterone levels and your PSA or prostate-specific antigen or testosterone level and who gets prostate A lot of 41:12 myths need to be busted so that people can feel comfortable using things that are safe and very effective. 41:22 Like I said, bioidentical hormones are chemically identical in structure to what our bodies make. 41:28 And this is a chemical representation of cholesterol, and cholesterol has a steroid ring structure. 41:37 So when we call hormone steroids, we're referring to the four rings that you see. 41:43 Cholesterol is how the manufacture of all of our hormones start. 41:49 So if you are working with a doctor who's trying to get your cholesterol as low as possible, you're losing out on some hormones because you don't have 42:01 as much cholesterol to convert into pregnenolone, progesterone testosterone, estrogen, DHEA, and all the things that make us feel good. 42:15 We did a lot of education in the Bredesen group about estrogen and what it does. 42:22 Estrogen prevents brain shrinkage. 42:26 It dampens that brain inflammation, which is one of the causes of cognitive decline. 42:32 Your nerves communicate with each other. 42:34 They have little feet that come out and attach to the next nerve and send signals. 42:40 estrogen helps to improve those connections. 42:45 Estrogen slows down the degeneration of nerves, which is what leads to loss of cognition. 42:51 And estrogen regulates plasticity. 42:54 So what's plastic city? 42:56 You know what plastic means? 42:59 Plastic is called plastic because it's malleable. 43:01 Plasticity means malliability, changeability. 43:07 Our brains are plastic. 43:10 That's why we can learn new things. 43:12 That's why we can unlearn trauma and unlearning pain because our brains and the nerves in our brain are plastic. 43:21 And estrogen regulates some of that laying down of new pathways that are healthier. 43:28 Estrogen increases our ability to detoxify the toxins that come in and affect our cognition. 43:36 And estrogen helps to maintain brain speed. 43:39 Very early on in my education in anti-aging medicine, I heard a talk by Dr. 43:44 Eric Braverman, who's a functional neurologist. 43:48 And I'll never forget this. 43:49 He said, women, and it's been shown in studies, who have their ovaries removed, so you have had a hysterectomy and you had your ovary removed and its before 43:59 the menopause time, those women lose 15% of their brain speed because they lose their hormones. 44:08 So important to maintain those hormones and not take out ovories unless it is absolutely essential. 44:16 Progesterone does many of the same things, I don't wanna bore you, but progesteron, among other things helps to maintain a healthy blood-brain barrier. 44:24 This can be a porous, sometimes it's not a barrier, it becomes porus and allows viruses, bacteria, and toxins to get into your brain. 44:35 So maintaining a health blood brain barrier is one of hedges against cognitive decline. 44:42 How do you do that? 44:44 The gut-brain connection is a really strong one. 44:47 And if you're having gastrointestinal problems, whether it's irritable bowel syndrome, inflammatory bowel disease like Crohn's or colitis, 44:58 if your gut is inflamed, the chances are your brain is inflamed. 45:03 If your got barrier connections are not functioning well, which is one of the things that happens in these disorders, chances our your blood- brain barrier 45:12 is not function well. 45:17 And as far as men go in terms of testosterone, low testosterone has been correlated with increased risk of Alzheimer's and by the same token, 45:27 giving testosterone enhances memory in men. 45:31 And it's thought possibly to be one of the reasons that testosterone enhance his memory for men is men as well as women convert some testosterone into estrogen. 45:43 And it's not done in our gonads. 45:46 It's done and tissues like the fat in your body, other tissues testosterone converts to estrogen. 45:53 So some of testosterone's effects for men is probably due to the estrogen that gets produced in low amounts. 46:03 The earlier you act, the greater your chance of maintaining a healthy brain and preventing Alzheimer's in the first place. 46:10 And what does that look like in terms of lifestyle? 46:13 It means getting regular exercise and. 46:17 Why is exercise important? 46:20 It does a lot of things. 46:23 It regulates blood sugar and helps with toxin elimination through sweating and a whole variety of other things, but the main point of this slide is to 46:32 show you that exercise stimulates the release of very important chemical called brain-derived neurotrophic factor. 46:43 And trophic means grow. 46:46 And so this is like Miracle Grow for your brain. 46:49 Everything that you can do to help raise your BDNF levels will help your bring. 46:56 So exercise is probably the best way to raise BdNf. 47:02 And it strengthens the connections between neurons and keeps your brand healthy. 47:09 Now, there's something called the Mousheimer's model of Alzheimer's disease. 47:13 They give mice a chemical that causes brain degeneration in a similar way that Alzheimer's does in humans. 47:24 And they then can test the mice. 47:27 So they found that exercise actually grew new brain cells and cleaned out debris from the brain so that new cells can grow. 47:39 What's the best exercise for brain health? 47:42 probably aerobic exercise, but really anything that you will do regularly is so much better than not doing anything, even walking. 47:53 Aerobic exercises has been shown to increase BDNF, increase brain volume, and increase cognition. 48:02 So you want to focus on getting your heart rate elevated. 48:06 High intensity interval training is one way to do that, where you do a really all out, push to get your heart rate up for 10, 20, 30 seconds a minute. 48:16 And then you back off and do a recovery. 48:18 Then you do that again, you that multiple times. 48:22 You can increase your heartbeat if you strength training on circuits, if keep going at a steady pace. 48:31 If you're walking, try to find hills to walk up. 48:34 It's a little hard in Southern California, but we have Signal Hill is a good hill. 48:39 And walking up hills will increase the intensity of your walking. 48:43 And you want to focus on challenging your body and trying new things because that is good for your brain also. 48:50 So change it up. 48:56 This is one of my favorite things. 49:03 Science scientists have discovered a revolutionary new treatment that makes you live longer. 49:10 It enhances your memory and makes more creative. 49:13 And it makes look more attractive. 49:16 Keeps you slim and lowers food cravings. 49:18 Protects from cancer and dementia. 49:21 Wards off colds and the flu. 49:24 You'll even feel happier, less depressed and less anxious. 49:28 Are you interested? 49:30 This is from a book called Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker. 49:34 It's one of my favorite books of all time. 49:36 Sleep will do all of those things for you. 49:47 Seven to eight hours a night. 49:50 You need to prioritize sleep. 49:52 Don't be so busy that you cut down on sleep for the sake of productivity, because I can tell you it will backfire in the long run.
Exercise and Sleep for Brain Health 50:02 Here we're gonna talk about some of the phases of sleep. 50:06 In the first half of a night, I mentioned that you produce growth hormone. 50:11 And growth hormones gets produced during the deepest levels of asleep. 50:17 You can see the cycle number one, how deep is shown by the graph. 50:23 So here's a wake up here. 50:26 And then you go down, down down into the deepest stages of deep sleep. 50:30 This is when growth hormone gets released. 50:33 And you, the cycles are about 90 minutes or so. 50:36 Then you come back out and you'll come up into REM sleep and REM Sleep is rapid eye movement sleep, and that's when you dream. 50:44 and then, you back down in to deep asleep. 50:48 The first half of the night you have the most deep-sleep in the cycle. 50:53 between 11 p.m. 50:54 and 3 a. 50:55 m. 50:55 And this is somebody goes to bed at 11 and wakes up at seven, that's their eight hour window. 51:00 As you get closer to the morning, the REM sleep episodes get longer and the deep sleep episode get shorter or disappear. 51:09 So what happens in non-REM or deep-sleep? 51:15 First of all, you release growth hormone. 51:19 Secondly, waste products like amyloid get removed. 51:25 There are other proteins. 51:26 Tau is another protein. 51:29 Basically, it's like a power wash for your brain. 51:32 Just like you accumulate waste product all day from your body, right? 51:36 You use the bathroom, you get rid of wasteproducts. 51:39 Well, your brains doesn't have that outlet, so it gets rid waste-product a different way. 51:44 And this is the really kind of creepy thing. 51:48 but there are cells in your brain that actually shrink by 40% while you're sleeping so that your cerebral spinal fluid can circulate more quickly and carry out, 52:02 carry away these toxins. 52:04 So you have major brain shrinkage temporarily during the night. 52:10 This is non-REM sleep or the deepest layers of sleep. 52:17 During this time, memories get filed away in long-term storage. 52:25 I think this is an error, the memories part. 52:29 Forget that. 52:30 Memories get stored in REM sleep, So REM sleep happens more the second part of the night. 52:37 And there's another creepy thing that goes on with REM Sleep, which is that your body is paralyzed. 52:42 You are paralyzed from the neck down in REM Slee. 52:47 Your muscles are totally relaxed. 52:49 There are sleep disorders called REM behavior disorders where people are not paralyzed, from their neck, down and actually act out their dreams. 52:58 and can get up and literally attack their bed partner. 53:02 So it ends up being a dangerous condition potentially. 53:05 They can hurt themselves also. 53:07 This is the time of dreaming. 53:13 Your eyes move, so it's called rapid eye movement sleep. 53:17 And it's when memory consolidation happens. 53:19 And so I must say, this slide is also wrong. 53:23 I got things switched up. 53:24 Growth hormone is the other slide, and memory consolidations on this side. 53:29 Sorry. 53:30 Just realized that while presenting this, I've given this talk a number of times. 53:34 So how do you get enough sleep for optimal cognition? 53:39 You want melatonin. 53:40 If you're on your computer late at night, if you watching TV late night. 53:45 You're your phone with the blue light, you are going to suppress your natural melotonin, which is your go to sleep hormone. 53:54 So turning off electronics an hour or two before you want to be asleep or at least wearing blue blocking glasses and they end up being kind of yellowy 54:03 orange and the block out those blue rays. 54:06 Stop watching the news before you go to bed, okay? 54:09 Like get your news in the morning so you have all day to process it and you're not all worked up when you got to sleep. 54:16 Keep your bedroom for sleep and sex only. 54:19 Now, this is hard during the pandemic because a lot of people are working out of their bedrooms. 54:23 But in general, try not to eat and do a whole variety of other things because it helps to train your body to know that when I get here, 54:33 it's time to go sleep, Meditating, meditation has been shown in scientific studies over and over again to improve sleep. 54:45 So if you're having problems with sleep, that should be your number one go-to thing to try. 54:50 The other thing that can be really helpful is Epsom salts in a bath. 54:54 And why is that? 54:55 So Epson salts are magnesium salts and magnesium is really brain calming and it gets absorbed through your skin. 55:05 The other thing that happens. 55:29 Okay. 55:30 Did was I muted for a long time? 55:33 Yes. 55:35 Oh, somebody muted me. 55:36 So let's see. 55:37 How many slides back did I get muted? 55:39 I'm so sorry. 55:41 Just on this slide. 55:43 And it looks like maybe one paragraph worth of what you were speaking. 55:48 It wasn't okay. 55:50 Great. 55:51 All right. 55:51 Well, let me go back because I just saw when we try to mute somebody who enters, everybody gets muted, including me. 55:58 I Just saw that. 56:00 So let's go that when you were talking about no news shows before bed. 56:04 Watch. 56:04 Oh, oh, great. 56:05 Okay. 56:06 It wasn't wrong. 56:07 Right. 56:09 OK. 56:09 You want to train your brain. 56:10 Your brain is very trainable. 56:13 And if you tell your brain like when you're in this room, this is for sleep. 56:17 So that's why you want to keep your bedrooms for sleeping sex only and what I was saying is it's gotten. 56:24 a bit confusing during the pandemic when people have their home offices in their bedrooms and are trying to juggle a variety of things. 56:32 But as much as possible, try to limit the time in your bedroom to sleep and sex, because that does help to train your brain. 56:40 When you're in here, it's beddy-bye. 56:42 It's kind of like training a toddler when it is time to go to Meditating has been shown in many, many studies to be effective for helping sleep and helping insomnia. 56:56 And really, it should be the first go-to thing if you're having trouble sleeping. 57:03 Epsom salt baths can be very helpful. 57:06 They are magnesium salts. 57:08 Magnesium and they get absorbed through your skin when you're in the bath and magnesium is very brain calming. 57:14 We have lots of people use magnesium at bedtime to help their sleep. 57:18 It's non sedating, but it tells your brain to calm down. 57:23 The other thing that happens with an Epsom salt bath is you get, you take a super hot bath, not super hop, it's just nice and hot. 57:32 And when get out, Your body cools down. 57:37 And that is another signal to your body that it's time to sleep. 57:40 That's why it is important to keep your room nice and cool. 57:43 The other thing is if you're having difficulty with insomnia, really important to get evaluated for sleep oxygenation problems, 57:59 because those for sure will kill your cognition, kill, your mood, cause diabetes, causes weight gain, caused cardiovascular disease, 58:10 has hypertension. 58:12 So we have a fairly low threshold at the Sklar Center for referring people for Sleep Studies. 58:19 One statistics I know, and I don't know if it's true for women or not, but for men, if you snore, there's a 70% chance that you have an oxygenation problem 58:30 during sleep. 58:31 And if you witness your partner, not just snoring, but waking up with a cough or choking sound, they probably have had an apnic episode and their oxygen 58:44 levels went so low that it finally brought them out of sleep with kind of like a start and a cost. 58:50 So if your witnessing that in your bed partner. 58:54 They need a sleep study. 58:57 Oxygenation during sleep is critical to good brain function. 59:04 What about toxins? 59:07 Air pollution increases Alzheimer's risk. 59:11 And now there are these ultrafine particles in the air. 59:16 They not only get into our bodies, they get intracellular, They get inside our cells and they are very brain damaging. 59:26 So we have a problem in Southern California. 59:28 You know, most of us live near freeways and there's lots of pollution. 59:33 And I live down at the ocean near the port of Long Beach. 59:36 You know what's happening there. 59:37 All those cargo container ships that are sitting out there, there's like 200 ships waiting to bring your products to you. 59:46 When they're out at sea, they all have their diesel fuel engines on and diesel is about the dirtiest burning fuel there is. 59:55 So we have had day after day of unsafe air quality levels. 1:00:03 So what can you do? 1:00:04 Use air filters in your bedroom. 1:00:06 You know, you spend a third of your life sleeping, or you should. 1:00:10 Use an air filter in you bedroom, and I'm really recommending air-filters everywhere you spent a lot of time because of the amount of pollution that there is. 1:00:19 Unless you live out in the country somewhere with this nice fresh air, lucky you. 1:00:26 What about infections? 1:00:28 So there are a number of infections that have been associated with Alzheimer's disease. 1:00:33 Like I said, many of them cross the blood-brain barrier, which is supposed to be impervious, but if it's not healthy, it has holes in it and things can 1:00:41 cross over. 1:00:44 Antibodies. 1:00:45 So if you have an infection of some kind, your body creates an immune response. 1:00:52 That immune responses are called antibodies. 1:00:55 They're our little fighting soldiers. 1:00:58 However, those fighting soldiers sometimes cross-react with brain tissue and will attack our own brain tissues. 1:01:06 Periodontal disease, gum disease is a big risk factor for Alzheimer's. 1:01:12 And there have been the same bacteria that's in your gums found in you brain somehow gets up there. 1:01:21 Herpes infections, Epstein-Barr, which causes mononucleosis, CMV, a cytomegalovirus. 1:01:28 These are all common viral infections. 1:01:31 We all get exposed to them. 1:01:33 Many of us have gotten these infections not in a full blown way, but the viruses are in our bodies. 1:01:41 And with age and the decline of our immune system, There are things we can do about it, but if your immune system is declining and you have viral infections 1:01:54 in the background, they can start to become active and start doing damage. 1:01:59 Lyme and Lyne co-infections like Babesia, Ehrlichia and Bartonella all can get into the brain and cause dementia.
Toxins, Infections, and Mold Exposure 1:02:09 Toxoplasmosis is carried by cats. 1:02:12 I was an obstetrician-gynecologist for many years and we used to worry about toxoplosmoses. 1:02:18 For pregnant women, it's carried by cats in the cat litter box, because if women get toxoplasmosis, that causes fetal abnormalities. 1:02:28 It also causes cognitive problems. 1:02:31 Chlamydia pneumonia is another common bacteria. 1:02:35 it has been associated with cardiovascular disease, also with Alzheimer's. 1:02:40 What about stomach ulcers? 1:02:41 You know, for a long time, it was thought that stomach Ulcers were caused by stress. 1:02:45 And then somebody made the great discovery since caused, by a bacteria called helicobacter pylori or H pilari. 1:02:51 That bacteria can end up in your brain. 1:02:57 Syphilis, of course, has been known for millennia causing dementia. 1:03:04 That is very well known. 1:03:05 And even in our modern era, people should still get checked for syphillis. 1:03:11 It's not common, but you really wouldn't want to miss that as a cause of cognitive decline because it's treatable. 1:03:18 What we're seeing more and more is mold and mold toxicity, mold from water intrusions in people's either their house, their place of work, 1:03:25 or even their cars. 1:03:27 And mold, when it grows, mold likes to have its own little territory. 1:03:33 It doesn't want other molds encroaching, so it produces toxins called mycotoxins. 1:03:39 They're volatile organic compounds. 1:03:41 And when we humans get exposed to those mycotoxin, they get into our bodies and can be very difficult to get rid of, and those can cause cognition problems. 1:03:56 just a picture of mold and yes, produces toxins that cause cognition problems. 1:04:04 So signs that you might be living with mold. 1:04:06 First of all, have you had water intrusions in your house? 1:04:09 It takes about under 24 hours for a water intrusion to allow mold to start growing. 1:04:16 If you act on the water, immediately clean it up, open it and let it dry out, maybe you won't have a mold problem. 1:04:24 Most of us end up finding that we have a leak somewhere. 1:04:27 We see a stain in the ceiling and then find out the leak's been going on for a long time. 1:04:32 And in a particle board that many of have making up our walls or mold spores and they start growing. 1:04:43 So you might have a musty smell, you may have asthma symptoms and shortness of breath, which can happen with mold exposure, 1:04:51 chronic cough, clearing your throat all the time. 1:04:54 You can get neurological symptoms like numbness and tingling, lose your sense of smell. 1:05:00 It can affect your gastrointestinal tract. 1:05:03 it can effect your sleep. 1:05:07 skin rashes, joint pain, mycotoxins, mold toxins can do a lot of different things, but most significantly in view of what we're talking about tonight can 1:05:18 cause cognitive decline. 1:05:20 And I was at a retreat with Dr. 1:05:22 Bredesen and a number of patients that were coming to be treated and one woman Getting out of her home and coming to the retreat out in India, 1:05:33 where it was nice and dry and no mold started improving right on the spot. 1:05:38 And she ended up not going back to her Home until it could get fixed. 1:05:42 I mean, she was gone for weeks or months. 1:05:45 because she realized when she was in a dry, non-moldy environment, her cognition improved. 1:05:51 And we ask patients that a lot of times when we suspect a moldy the environment. 1:05:56 Do you feel better when you go on vacation? 1:05:58 I mean, people feel there when they're on a vacation for a lotta things, because they are away from their usual stresses. 1:06:03 But for things like joint pain and breathing problems and cognitive problems, do you fell better, when your someplace outside your home? 1:06:11 That can be a tip-off that you may have mold in your house. 1:06:17 Getting rid of toxins is complicated. 1:06:21 So a lot of toxins exist in the fat in our bodies. 1:06:26 All of the environmental pollutants that are things like flame retardants, the things in plastics, pesticides, When those get into our bodies, 1:06:40 they get held in body fat and they're very difficult to get rid of. 1:06:44 Sweating is one way to gets rid those things. 1:06:49 Being in a far infrared sauna where you sweat is a way do it. 1:06:53 Exercise with sweating is the way you do. 1:06:56 A lot of toxins can only be sweated out. 1:06:59 Mold toxins, we give binders that adhere to the mold toxin and come out through the gut. 1:07:07 A lot of toxins don't come out that way. 1:07:12 You want to cut down your toxin exposure, so using safe, natural, non-toxic products at home, not the things that are on this slide like Mr. 1:07:22 Clean and Pledge. 1:07:25 and all that stuff. 1:07:26 They have a ton of chemicals. 1:07:28 You can go on the environmental working group website, ewg.org, and they have whole list of safe household products to use. 1:07:38 And there's like vinegar and water and ammonia and bleach, things like that. 1:07:47 Like you don't need all of these chemicals to clean adequately. 1:07:54 You wanna eat organic produce and cosmetics. 1:08:01 So whatever you put on your skin, just like the magnesium from the Epsom salt is a good thing when it gets absorbed through your skincare. 1:08:09 Your skin absorbs the bad things too. 1:08:12 Cosmetics have parabens in them that get absorbed into our bodies and do damage. 1:08:18 You want to be sure that your cosmetics are non-toxic cosmetics Continue to use your brain. 1:08:27 And like I said, higher education and higher occupational level yield higher brain reserve. 1:08:34 Everybody hasn't had that opportunity or for one reason or another couldn't. 1:08:38 But there are lots of things that you can do at any stage in life, like doing challenging brain activities, learning new things, 1:08:46 learn an instrument, memorizing poems, maintaining your social connections are really important. 1:08:53 People who are bilingual, it seems to protect them against dementia by a number of years. 1:08:59 But there are many things you can do. 1:09:01 There are brain games we recommend. 1:09:05 reading and crossword puzzles. 1:09:07 Reading is probably one of the best cognitive things you can do. 1:09:11 This is called Brain HQ and it has been scientifically shown to reduce risk of dementia. 1:09:18 It's all of these online brain games haven't, but this one has. 1:09:23 And you go to brainhq.com. 1:09:26 They have a free version that you try and then there's a paid version. 1:09:29 That's more extensive. 1:09:33 What about stress? 1:09:36 Stress does a lot of things. 1:09:38 It depletes your hormones which are brain protective. 1:09:43 it can cause weight gain, moodiness, it creates silent inflammation which increases risk of all chronic diseases, heart disease, 1:09:52 cancer, and Alzheimer's. 1:09:56 So we live in a stressful world. 1:09:59 We're going through a pandemic that's added stress So it's imperative that you do something every day that will lower your body's physiologic response 1:10:13 to stress. 1:10:14 So you may still have all those factors going on in your life. 1:10:17 But if you one of these things every, day you will your cortisol level and lower all of the metabolic steps that happen when cortisol levels are chronically elevated. 1:10:32 Yoga has been shown to decrease stress, decrease inflammation, increase the plasticity or the ability to learn new things in your brain to set down new pathways. 1:10:43 Yoga increases BDNF. 1:10:46 It increases antioxidants. 1:10:48 Oxidation is one of the deteriorating processes that go on in our bodies and our brains. 1:10:54 And it increases telomerase. 1:10:56 Telomerases is an enzyme that helps to maintain our telomeres, which are an indicator of longevity in chromosomes.
Stress Reduction and Mind-Body Practices 1:11:07 This is a Kundalini yoga study. 1:11:13 kriya is called the satta nama kria and you just go sat ta na ma and do that repeatedly and studies have been done on it. 1:11:26 And they took 81 people who were over age 55 and they had mild cognitive impairment, which meant they were able to carry on their daily activities, 1:11:36 but needed a lot of AIDS remembering or people helping them remember writing things down so they wouldn't forget. 1:11:42 And, they, were assigned to this CREA. 1:11:47 or a gold standard of some memory enhancement training, you know, how to remember things using mnemonics and stuff like that. 1:11:55 So the memory improved in both of those groups. 1:12:00 But the short and long term executive function Meaning your brain's ability to plan, execute, and organize, which is one of the things that deteriorates 1:12:13 with Alzheimer's, only improved with the Kundalini yoga. 1:12:18 There was decreased depression and increased resilience and increase blood flow to the brain with Kundalin yoga that didn't happen with conventional memory 1:12:31 enhancement training. 1:12:34 Meditation. 1:12:35 decreases cortisol levels, increases immune function, decreases inflammation, and improves blood flow in what's called the prefrontal cortex, 1:12:46 which is the front of your brain where all of this executive organizational planning ability happens. 1:12:53 And improved memory testing. 1:13:02 And then mindfulness-based stress reduction is another type of meditation. 1:13:08 More stress in people's lives is correlated with increased mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's. 1:13:15 And mindfulness based stress-reduction, I showed you the shrunken brain with Alzheimer. 1:13:23 It actually decreased the shrinkage in the hippocampus, which is the memories part of the brain in center of brain. 1:13:32 And it improves the connectivity between the front of the brain, which is the thinking and executive part and the memory part, 1:13:38 the hippocampus. 1:13:40 And this was, it did two hours of weekly lessons for eight weeks. 1:13:45 So it's two hour a week for 8 weeks, and then you practiced at home for 30 minutes a day. 1:13:51 These people had brain changes that were impressive and reduced stress and an increased feeling of well-being. 1:14:00 And Tai Chi is a moving meditation. 1:14:02 So if you're somebody that has trouble sitting still and focusing, Tai chi is beautiful, you know, smooth ballet like moving mediation. 1:14:14 And a lot of work has been done looking at Taichi. 1:14:19 There is increase in brain volume, hippocampal volume. 1:14:23 and again, the connection between the front of your brain and the memory part of the brain. 1:14:29 So lots of ideas for what you can do to lower stress, very important. 1:14:36 So that's the end of the presentation, and I know there are some questions, so I'm happy to answer them. 1:14:42 I did find out right again before this, one of people in our reticence study group that there is going to be an Alzheimer's summit next week. 1:14:52 That's one of those free online summits. 1:14:54 You can listen for free at the time it's being given, and then you can actually buy the summit if you want to listen later. 1:15:01 And so if your request to get the slides from this presentation, it will have this link on it for the Alzheimer summit. 1:15:11 and you could probably also Google Alzheimer Summit Robert Lufkin, L-U-F-K-I-N. 1:15:21 And text us if you are interested in getting a copy of the slideshow. 1:15:26 Text 562-280-2191 and we'll receive that. 1:15:33 Give us your name, phone number, and email. 1:15:36 Write info if like a of a slide show. 1:15:40 We have an ebook called Boost Your Hormones, Boost your Brain. 1:15:44 And if would like that, that's a free gift. 1:15:46 You type in gift, If you would like to be on our email list and are not currently put in list, and contact us for a consult if you're interested in a consultation. 1:16:03 And let's see, with that, I'm going to start looking at our questions. 1:16:15 Let's say. 1:16:26 Oh, what I think of Ozemp. 1:16:27 So somebody wants to know what i think ozempic, which is a blood sugar lowering medication. 1:16:37 as it relates to Alzheimer's. 1:16:39 Yes, so definitely some people actually call Alzheimer, you know, there's diabetes type one that usually happens in childhood. 1:16:48 That's an autoimmune disorder. 1:16:50 There's Diabetes type two, which is generally a lifestyle, weight gain, poor diet, insulin resistance problem that happens in midlife.
Q&A and Resources 1:17:00 And some people have called Alzheimer's diabetes type three, because what happens is you develop insulin in the brain. 1:17:10 So many of the steps that we recommend to take the 12 hour fast, the three hours between supper and when you go to bed, the exercise and building muscle 1:17:23 are all to lower insulin resistance in your body, which also helps to low it in the brain. 1:17:28 Semiglutide is the generic name for Ozempic, and it is very effective at regulating blood sugar. 1:17:38 It's expensive, but if you're able to get it, I think it's a great thing to use. 1:17:46 I don't know that it is a substitute for diet and exercise as far as Alzheimer's goes, Let's see, somebody had a question about learning a new language, 1:18:01 and is this helped to avoid Alzheimer's? 1:18:04 Definitely. 1:18:04 You saw the slide on being bilingual, cutting down Alzheimer, prolonging any dementia by four and a half years. 1:18:14 Anything new that you learn, whether it's a language or an instrument, a game, or a sport, Any of these things is good for keeping your brain going in 1:18:29 a healthy way. 1:18:33 A question about nootropics. 1:18:35 So no tropics are supplements that help improve brain power. 1:18:43 Somebody said, am I a proponent of no atropix or are they just snake oil? 1:18:47 No, they're not snake, oil. 1:18:49 But what we found is, If somebody has underlying problems like mole toxicity, hormone decline, inflammation, those things are not gonna suddenly get their 1:19:04 brains to start working well. 1:19:06 So what you wanna do is correct the underlying things, the underlining root causes that are keeping your brain from working optimally. 1:19:14 And yes, nootropics can help your function better. 1:19:19 It's not a solution to everybody with cognitive decline, like I said, because you've got to correct some of these other things. 1:19:23 But I would say it's just snake oil. 1:19:26 And I think it is worth a try. 1:19:27 Let's see. 1:19:31 Oh, and then people said that we lost the audio. 1:19:36 So has everybody asked their questions? 1:19:40 What did I do? 1:19:41 Let me see, maybe we can. 1:19:47 Is there anybody who wants to ask a question by unmuting themselves or have we gotten through all the questions? 1:20:07 Nope. 1:20:10 Well, again, let us know if you'd like a copy of the slideshow. 1:20:14 The Alzheimer's Summit begins on Monday after Thanksgiving. 1:20:19 If you like to get our free ebook, Boost Your Hormones, boost your brain. 1:20:24 We're happy to send it to you. 1:20:25 And if you'd like to be on our email list, please contact us. 1:20:29 Thank you for your attention. 1:20:30 I know it was a long presentation, but I appreciate that you stayed on and stayed all the way through. 1:20:37 If you have questions later on, you can always get in touch with us, so thanks again and thanks to Riley for being here late. 1:20:54 Everyone.
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