Simple ways to reduce dementia risk with diet

Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia, but not all dementia is Alzheimer’s disease.

Other types of dementia include vascular dementia and mixed dementia, express.co.uk wrote.

Whilst we’ve always known that food can affect how our bodies look, we are now learning more about how foods can affect our brain function.

Researchers revealed that running, walking, yoga and tai chi have all been shown to ‘significantly’ boost brain power in the over 50s, adding that any exercise which leaves people breathless helps with the benefits evident irrespective of the current state of someone’s brain health. But what brain boosting foods should people be eating? Dr. Marilyn Glenville, nutritionist and author of the brand new Natural Solutions for Dementia and Alzheimer’s has listed the top five foods to eat to reduce the risk of developing the disease. She said: “Your brain function does change as you get older. “Age tends to affect your ability to store and retrieve information and you may find that words and putting faces to names sometimes eludes you.

“As I am a nutritionist the aspect of self-care in preventing Alzheimer’s and dementia I am most interested in is, of course, diet and I believe that what you eat can have a huge impact on the health of your brain.”

The nutritionist has listed five types of food to eat and why they are beneficial.

Eat unrefined carbohydrates

We used to think that the only purpose of insulin was to regulate blood sugar, but we now know that it also regulates our neurotransmitters — the brain chemicals, such as acetylcholine, that are important for learning and memory.

A diet that included unrefined carbohydrates rather than refined ones, is the best way to prevent or reverse the insulin resistance that has been linked to Alzheimer’s.

If you switch from quick-burn white food to slow burn whole foods, you create a speedy, gradual rise in your blood sugar.

The body hardly has to respond at all — having to release only a small amount of insulin to deal with it.

Eat protein with every meal

You can improve the low Gi-effect of unrefined carbohydrates even further if you try to include protein in every meal and most snacks.

The body takes longer to process proteins than other foods, so adding protein effectively slows down the absorption of nutrients in your food, including the carbohydrate.

Eat less sugar

It is really important to cut down on added sugar as much as you possibly can. Sugar is one of the most refined carbohydrates available and a real enemy for anyone trying to avoid dementia and Alzheimer’s.

Eat little and often

It is obvious that what you eat can have a huge impact on your blood sugar levels, but also important is the timing of when you eat.

To keep blood sugar levels stable you need to create a slow, low rise in blood sugar after a meal, so your pancreas does not have to produce large amounts of insulin to deal with a quick sugar rush.

And you need to try and maintain a steady level until you eat the next meal or snack.

Eat more healthy fats

Forget switching to a tasteless low-fat diet and boost your intake of the sort of healthy fats you find in oily fish, such as salmon, nuts and seeds.

These good fats are called ‘essential fatty acids’ because they are essential to your health.

They include polyunsaturated fats, omega 6 fats and omega 3 fats — the most important of which for brain health are the omega 3s.