The Mediterranean diet is rich in fruits and vegetables while low in sodium. It is also enriched with olive oil, high in antioxidants as well as monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats.
From the earliest moments of life, children begin to learn the fundamentals of language. The most powerful influence for effective language development are the verbal interactions with caregivers.
The food we eat goes beyond its macronutrients of carbohydrates, fat and protein. It's information. It interacts with and instructs our genome with every mouthful, changing genetic expression.
Inflammation is the cornerstone of Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's, multiple sclerosis - all of the neurodegenerative diseases are really predicated on inflammation.
Two forms of fat that are vitally important for brain health are cholesterol and saturated fat.
While the hippocampus itself doesn't store memories, it serves to triage our experiences based upon their survival significance.
Shoot for a total of no more than 80 grams of carbs in your daily diet. This means favoring vegetables that grow above ground like kale, broccoli, spinach, and cauliflower as opposed to those that store carbohydrate in the form of starch like potatoes and beets.
Bad things happen. And the human brain is especially adept at making sure that we keep track of these events. This is an adaptive mechanism important for survival.
Dementia is our most-feared illness, more than heart disease or cancer.
Increase your consumption of healthful fats like extra virgin olive oil, avocado, grass-fed beef, wild fish, coconut oil, nuts and seeds. At the same time, keep in mind that modified fats like hydrogenated or trans fats are the worst choices for brain health.
Strokes are categorized as either bleeding into the brain or a blockage in blood supply, known as an ischemic stroke. The latter are overwhelmingly more common, compromising about 87 percent of all stroke events.
The idea that people are nutritionally deprived because they don't eat grain has no scientific basis.
Rarely, Type 2 diabetes develops without any readily identifiable predisposing factor. But in the great majority of cases, it is brought on by lifestyle activities, including, and clearly most importantly, dietary choices.
Our ancestors relied upon their advanced brains to survive during times of food shortage, and fortunately, the human brain is able to utilize body fat as an extremely efficient fuel to sustain function when glucose-providing food is unavailable.
Carbs are devastating for the brain.
Humans are not the fastest or the strongest animals on the planet, but when it comes to survival, we have had the unique advantage of being clever.
Memory enhancement self-help programs abound and promise improved memory performance by the utilization of any number of seemingly unique techniques focused on the context of how information is encoded.
As a practicing neurologist, I can tell you first hand that working with Parkinson's patients offers clinical challenges. But from an emotional perspective, this disease can border on overwhelming.
Mental fitness is served by consciously redirecting our attention away from the constant bombardment from the media whose reason to be seems to be focused on keeping us in a state of constant alert.
The bottom line is that this author, a practicing neurologist dealing with Alzheimer's disease on a daily basis, believes we need to expand the public awareness that modifiable lifestyle factors have a profound role to play in determining who will or won't get this disease.
