Brain Health - What is Your Dementia Risk?

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Beginning in January, 2018, I began taking a brain health class from a local college. The classes are led by a variety of local experts, including researchers from the University of California at Irvine, as well as nutritionists, psychologists and others. The information I have learned has been fascinating. I plan to share information about the classes on my retirement blog, baby-boomer-retirement.com, but I also thought I would relay some of the information to my friends here on MyLot. We all want to have healthy brains! I'll use the same photo of a brain at the top of each of my posts, so they will be easy for you to find. Before I go into the research, I want to give a short overview of dementia and Alzheimers, since they confuse many people. Dementia is the overall name for a number of brain conditions which include Alzheimer's Disease, vascular dementia, Lewy Body dementia, Parkinson's Disease dementia and others. Alzheimer's is the most common, making up an estimated 60% of dementia cases. There are marked differences in what happens in the brain when you have different types of dementia. Alzheimer's is thought to be caused by plaques and tangles which build up for decades before symptoms are noticeable. Other types of dementia can be caused by a variety of diseases, vascular problems, strokes, aneurysms, medications, sleep problems and other issues. A few types of dementia are sometimes reversible, for example when it is caused by medications. However, once symptoms are present, most types of dementia are irreversible. The first topic in my brain health class came from Dr. Claudia Kawas, a researcher and neurologist at the University of California - Irvine, who is involved in the 90+ Study, which was featured on the television news magazine, "60 Minutes." She is studying what she calls "the oldest of the old." Dr. Kawas also has a website on which she has posted some of her research findings including: People who drank moderate amounts of alcohol or coffee lived longer than those who abstained. People who were overweight in their 70s lived longer than normal or underweight people did. Over 40% of people aged 90 and older suffer from dementia while almost 80% are disabled. Both are more common in women than men. About half of people with dementia over age 90 do not have sufficient neuropathology in their brain to explain their cognitive loss. People aged 90 and older with an APOE2 gene are less likely to have clinical Alzheimer’s dementia, but are much more likely to have Alzheimer’s neuropathology in their brains. You can find her website at: Wonder what your risk is of having dementia? At age 90, you have a 40% risk. At age 85, you have a 20% risk. At age 80, you have a 10% risk. At age 75, you have a 5% risk. At age 70, you have a 2% risk. As you can see, your risk doubles every five years starting at age 75, although younger adults can develop dementia, too. In the coming weeks, watch for more posts about what we can do to reduce our risk of developing dementia. Learn more about what Dr. Kawas has discovered in this video: https://video.search.yahoo.com/search/video?fr=mcafee&p=dr+claudia+kawas+60+minutes#id=2&vid=c1b642bcadc5f54745047af99d91873a&action=click