Sage advice for identifying Alzheimer’s early
If you’re concerned about dementia or Alzheimer’s disease, either for a family member or yourself, we’re here with some sage advice. Consider the words of Thomas Jefferson: “I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.”
So if you put some effort into learning about early detection of Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia, you just might get lucky too. Early detection allows doctors to slow or even sometimes halt dementia’s progress.
Our sage advice? Try the athome screening test developed by researchers at Ohio State University called the SelfAdministered Gerocognitive Exam, or S.A.G.E.
This simple test (Google “OSU S.A.G.E.” to download) takes only 10-15 minutes to complete and was designed to detect early signs of cognitive impairment. Dr. Mike’s Cleveland Clinic and its Wellness Institute use S.A.G.E. to help decide if you’re a candidate for its brain wellness shared medical appointment program or need neurologic treatment from its Neurologic Institute.
Another early sign of Alzheimer’s: your nose. The part of the brain that controls smell often is affected in the early stages of the disease. So if you notice that you’re having trouble picking up fragrances or odors, talk to your doctor.
Whatever your age, family history or cognitive powers, remember that staying engaged and curious, socializing with family and friends, getting 10,000 steps a day or the equivalent, doing “speed of processing” games like brainHQ’s Double Decision, and sticking with brain-healthy nutrition, like the Mediterranean diet, helps protect your brain.
Processed meat and asthma
Americans love their hot dogs, but the consequences of ingesting the processed and/or cured wiener are, well, not so hot. In 2015 the World Health Organization definitively linked eating 50 grams of processed meat a day to an 18 percent increase in colon cancer risk.
A study published in the journal Thorax found that cured meats literally can take your breath away! Researchers revealed that people with asthma who ate cured meat (bacon, salami, corned beef, pepperoni, pastrami and prosciutto treated with nitrites) at least four times weekly were 76 percent more likely to have worsening lung function over the length of the study, especially if they were overweight (the people, not the portions, but those too!).
The problems may be from nitrites — preservatives that KO bacteria in cured meats but can cause inflammation and damage your body’s cells — or other factors in processed meats. But one thing’s for sure: If you want to hot-dog around the basketball court or down the slopes, you’ll breathe easier if you dodge nitrate-laden dogs, say “no” to lunchmeats and opt for vegetable proteins like nuts and beans, and lean proteins like skinless poultry and salmon.
Mother fears vaccines
Q: One of my neighbors thinks vaccines are a health risk, and she can’t be convinced of the science. I read her your columns about HPV vaccines because she has three daughters, but I can’t get through to her. What else can I do?
Jenny E., Largo, Florida
A: It’s ironic, but it’s precisely because of the great success of vaccines that she has the luxury to think like that. Smallpox was declared eradicated in 1980, and we’re betting your friend has never seen a child die from measles or witnessed the crippling and scarring left behind by polio. The chance your friend’s kids will benefit versus suffer a serious complication from an entire battery of vaccines is more than 40,000 to 1. When vaccines are doing their job and most of the population is getting them, it makes it seem far less urgent to get the inoculations — but actually, it’s just as important as ever.
Here’s another example that shows how important vaccines are and how effective they can be in protecting the general population:
Rotavirus is a highly contagious stomach bug that triggers stomach cramps, diarrhea, fever and vomiting. Traditionally, it sent one in five children to the doctor and one in 10 to the hospital. But since the rotavirus vaccine was developed in 2013 (given as two doses, one at 8 weeks old and the second at 12 weeks), childhood cases have dropped almost 70 percent. And after it became part of the national infant immunization program in the U.K. (the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also lists it on their infant vaccination schedule), British researchers noted something else: Cases of rotavirus, as well as acute gastroenteritis, declined in older children and adults. They call it “herd immunity”: Everyone benefits from the vaccine even if they haven’t had it, because of the overall decrease in instances of circulating rotavirus. In short, because babies are vaccinated, we all stay healthier.
Unfortunately, if too many folks skip vaccines, the herd immunity fails, and a disease can reappear. That is particularly a hazard for the young, elderly and those with a compromised immune system.
Contact the You Docs at realage. com.