Can You Prevent Alzheimer’s Disease?

There’s an old adage that prevention is better than cure. With Alzheimer’s and similar mental disorders, prevention is your only hope since there’s no known cure for this deadly affliction. There are people who doubt if this severe illness can be prevented, especially if your genetic history makes you prone to it. While it is true that Alzheimer’s disease cannot be prevented completely, it is a proven fact that it can be postponed by as many as 10 years by following a few simple rules.

It’s not only genetics that determine whether you are affected by Alzheimer’s; it’s the environment and your way of life too. While you cannot change your genes, you do have the power to change your life and how you live it. If you want to postpone the onset of Alzheimer’s, here’s what you need to do:

• Exercise, both your body and mind: Just as regular physical exercise is necessary to keep your body healthy and fit, so is mental exercise needed to keep all your brain cells functioning like new. The saying “Use it or lose it” takes on a literal meaning here – as long as you keep using your brain, you’re challenging yourself and pushing your boundaries. You’re also boosting blood supply to the brain and this keeps your blood vessels in good shape, something that has been proven to keep the physical signs of Alzheimer’s like impaired memory and cognitive functions away even though the brain shows presence of the plaques and tangles that are associated with Alzheimer’s.

  Physical exercise also boosts blood flow to your brain, and mentally stimulating activities like puzzles and board games enhance your learning abilities. Trying new things, like learning a new language or how to play an instrument, also helps in using different areas of your brain and keeping the whole area active.

• Watch what you eat: It’s the same advice for both physical and mental health – eat foods that are good for you, foods that contain a balanced amount of protein, carbohydrates that act slowly to release energy, and fats that are not saturated. Also include lots of vegetables and fruits in your meals and cut down on the fried foods and snacks.
• Change your habits: If you smoke, stop cold turkey. If you drink regularly, limit yourself to one drink a day if you cannot stop altogether. If you’re overweight, work on removing those excess pounds. If you’re subject to stress, focus on learning how to relax.
• Be socially active: The more friends you have, the more you go out, the more you enjoy interacting with people, the longer you can delay Alzheimer’s. When you lead an active lifestyle, you’re always on the go and you always have something to do. This keeps both your body and mind active. It’s especially important to remember this when you’re old and want to withdraw from society and live a quiet life. Remaining socially active will keep your brain healthy. `

Besides this, you need to prevent any severe head injuries that could jar your brain and affect it adversely. There are medications that may be successful in slowing the onset of Alzheimer’s, but you need to talk to your doctor about it before you decide if you need them or not.

If you enjoyed this article, please bookmark it at del.icio.us »

This entry was posted on Monday, August 31st, 2009 at 12:54 pm and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.