Keeping up a sharp Mind

https://www.everydayhealth.com/longevity/mental-fitness/brain-exercises-for-memory.aspx

Research suggests that when it comes to keeping your mind sharp, exercising your body as well as your mind and sticking to healthy habits is the ideal formula.

Authors of a study published in July 2019 in The Journal of the American Medical Association followed about 196,400 participants ages 60 and older who didn’t have cognitive impairment or dementia when they joined the study for eight years. They gathered data on participants’ lifestyle habits, such as current smoking status, regular physical activity, healthy diet, and alcohol consumption. Ultimately, researchers found that a healthy lifestyle was associated with a lower dementia risk among participants, regardless of genetic risk for Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias.

Another study, published in Neurology in July 2020, found that people who participate in multiple healthy behaviors significantly reduce their risk for Alzheimer’s disease, the most common form of dementia. For about six years, the study tracked five healthy lifestyle behaviors — nonsmoking, regular physical activity, low to moderate alcohol consumption, adherence to a Mediterranean-style diet, and engagement in activities that boost cognitive skills — in nearly 2,800 adults and found that those who followed at least four of the behaviors were about 60 percent less likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease.“Approaches to brain health include a well-balanced diet low in fat, low in cholesterol, and high in antioxidants,” says Robert Bender, MD, section chief of the Geriatric and Memory Center at Broadlawns Medical Center in Des Moines, Iowa. Foods high in antioxidants include nuts, fruits (especially berries), veggies, chocolate, and herbs and spices, past research notes.

In addition to good nutrition, regular exercise can promote vascular health to help protect brain tissue. Avoiding ruts and boredom is also critical. “The brain wants to learn new things,” says Dr. Bender, adding that some researchers believe people are more vulnerable to dementia when they pay less attention to the things around them. “When the brain is passive, it has a tendency to atrophy,” he adds. Therefore, sedentary and relatively passive activities, such as sitting in front of a TV for hours a day, can be detrimental to brain health over time.

Physical exercise can also be particularly beneficial for the brain. In a small study published in September 2018 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers found that a single 10-minute period of low-intensity pedaling on a stationary bike was associated with increased activity in the brain’s hippocampus, the part of the brain responsible for creating new memories and remembering facts and events.

And a small study published in July 2019 in the Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society found that a single moderate-intensity workout session immediately before a cognitive task resulted in greater brain activation. The researchers measured the brain activity of 26 healthy adults ages 55 to 85 on two separate days. On one day, they had participants rest for 30 minutes before identifying famous and nonfamous names; on a separate day, they had participants pedal a stationary bike for 30 minutes before doing the same activity. The result: There was significantly greater brain activation after exercise. This finding led researchers to conclude that exercise can immediately change the way our brains function, which added to existing scientific evidence that physical activity helps strengthen brain function and memory.

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Keeping up a sharp Mind

Brain exercises to boost memory

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Keeping up a sharp Mind