THE ALZHEIMER’S SOLUTION

Why a good night’s sleep is your best defence against dementia

ALL this week, a pair of Alzheimer’s researchers have been sharing their expertise with Mail readers and revealing how simple lifestyle tweaks can help fend off the disease. Today, they tell you why sleep is so important, and what you can do to make sure your brain is getting enough down-time . . .

WOULDN’T it be incredible to look into your future and imagine never forgetting a name, losing your keys, repeating yourself or ever having to rely on loved ones to take care of you?

Imagine being able to continue doing all the things you love well into your 70s, 80s and beyond without worrying about your mind.

Dementia has become a modern plague, the number one cause of death in the UK, and a devastating condition that now blights almost every family.

Our simple lifestyle plan provides the answer. Working as a husband-and-wife team at our clinic in the U.S., we have dedicated our careers as neurologists to finding a cure for Alzheimer’s.

Our years of studies and experience with Alzheimer’s patients have now proven that the solution lies not (yet) with some kind of silver bullet pharmacological cure, but something far more simple, inexpensive, and easily within everyone’s grasp.

We have seen hundreds of patients use our simple plan of lifestyle changes to reverse what seemed to be an imminent Alzheimer’s diagnosis, and our findings have formed the basis of our life-changing new book, The Alzheimer’s Solution, which is being serialised this week in the Daily Mail.

At the heart of our message is the fact that brain health is influenced by five main lifestyle factors: nutrition, exercise, managing stress, restorative sleep and brain training.

Sleep is key. In fact, our clinical experience has shown us again and again that good quality sleep, night after night, is critical to cognitive function and quality of life as you get older. Forget your trendy juice cleanses or detox plans; seven to eight hours of good solid sleep each night will do more to remove toxins (as well as negative thoughts and memories) than any other regime or drug.

Sleep was designed especially for the brain. This is when it drifts into a different state designed to consolidate memory and thought. Short-term memories are converted to long-term, unneeded memories are eliminated, thought processes are organised and new brain connections are built.

This is when the brain undergoes its routine repairs, and the regeneration of neurons and their supporting cells can occur. The cocktail of chemicals released during sleep calm inflammation and bolster immunity — better sleep leads to fewer colds and immune-related disorders, and even a lower risk of cancer.

If you are keen to protect your mental and physical health into old age, and dramatically reduce your risk of Alzheimer’s, you would be well advised to take steps to improve the quality of your sleep.

Studies show that poor sleep, over time, leads to brain atrophy and shrinkage. It causes the brain’s specialised waste clearance cells to turn on themselves, pruning the very cells they should be trying to preserve, destroying healthy neurons and their connections.

The ‘brain fog’ you might get after a really bad night’s sleep is the same in early Alzheimer’s. Lack of sleep impairs your ability to function during the day, slowing your focus, your processing speed and your shortterm memory.

AS eVeRYONe who has tried to function properly after a sleepless night knows, lack of sleep can blunt our responses, making us more likely to drop things and struggle with intricate or even simple actions.

In the elderly, a slight drop in sleep quality can be enough to negatively affect hand- eye co-ordination, increasing the risk of both car accidents and falls.

Sleeplessness appears to inhibit the ‘frontal lobe’ area of the brain causing the sleep deprived to make poor decisions. It certainly leaves you vulnerable to cravings which can lead to over-eating and weight gain.

Being short on sleep leads to a greater desire for high-fat foods and sweets, and triggers the release of appetite- stimulating hormones (leptin and ghrelin) which contrive to make dieting impossible. There is also a direct link between poor sleep and your body’s ability to process insulin.

These combined factors explain how people who don’t sleep enough are more likely to develop type 2 diabetes, which has been repeatedly linked to dementia and cognitive decline.

Despite all its known benefits, insufficient sleep has become a major public health concern as many of us are failing to get