Smoking and Brain Fitness

As though there wasn’t already enough evidence that smoking tobacco is bad for you, a new study shows a significant relation between smoking in your late 50’s and the chance of developing dementia about 20 years later. Smoking has multiple effects on your body, especially your heart, and this study again supports the idea that things that are bad for your heart are also bad for brain fitness.

The study published online in the Archives of Internal Medicine used data from more than 20,000 members of a health care organization. They completed surveys in the late 1970s to the early 1980s. The authors of the study looked at how many of them were later diagnosed with dementia.

Results showed that the risk of getting dementia (either Alzheimer’s disease or vascular dementia) increased steadily the more people reported smoking. For less than a pack a day, the increase was small and not statistically significant. But for larger amounts of smoking, the increased risk was significant, and for people smoking more than two packs per day, the risk was doubled.

This study once again shows that brain fitness is also cardiovascular fitness. The same things that cause clogged arteries around your heart may very well result in clogged arteries in your brain.

One good note: people who described themselves as former smokers had the same risk as those who never smoked. So quitting now may help reduce your risk later.

Reference:

Rusanen M et al (2010). Heavy smoking in midlife and long-term risk of Alzheimer disease and vascular dementia. Archives of Internal Medicine. Published online October 25, 2010. View the abstract here.

Sleep: Brain Fitness and Weight Loss

I’ve written before about the key role of sleep in memory and brain fitness. Sleep deprivation has a negative effect on memory, concentration, and decision-making. Like depression, many of us think about sleep as something that goes on independent of other chemical processes in the body, but nothing could be further from the truth.

Now a new study in the Annals of Internal Medicine shows that losing weight may be harder if you don’t get enough sleep. Researchers at the US Food and Drug Administration showed that people on a diet and who were deprived of enough sleep (they only got 5 1/2 hours a night)  lost less fat than a similar group who got 8 1/2 hours of sleep. Worse in some ways was the fact that the sleep-restricted group lost weight from lean body mass (for example, muscle) more than the group who got enough sleep. People who are dieting and exercising in order to cut down fat and increase lean body mass should thus definitely be getting enough sleep.

In the past decade, researchers have focused interest on a neurohormone called ghrelin. It’s involved in sleep, appetite regulation, and energy metabolism. So once again the body’s neurochemistry links sleep and appetite. Both getting enough sleep and maintaining a healthy body weight are key to brain fitness.

Reference:

Nedeltcheva AV et a. (2010). Insufficient sleep undermines dietary efforts to reduce adiposity. Annals of Internal Medicine, 153;435-441.  Read the abstract here.