Another Strategy to Protect Your Brain Article of the week Apr 30 to May 4, 2018
Two weeks ago I wrote an article of the week entitled, “How to Prevent Your Brain from Shrinking”. I hope this article impressed upon you the importance of taking steps to increase your cardiovascular health if you want to drastically decrease your likelihood of contracting Alzheimer's or another form of dementia as you age.
As with any health condition, there is always more than one habit you need to establish if you are going to safeguard your health and prevent disease. Contrary to mainstream medicine, which often offers one prescription or strategy to battle a health challenge, preventing illness and promoting wellness is most often multi-faceted. Alzheimer's and dementia is yet another example of a condition that can be prevented when focusing on lifestyle.
In addition to getting cardiovascular exercise that challenges your heart and lungs, a very specific vitamin has been shown to promote brain health as you age. In an important study conducted at the University of Exeter medical school and published in the journal Neurology in August 2014, adults who were moderately deficient in vitamin D had a 53 percent increased risk of developing dementia, and the risk increased to 125 percent in those who were severely deficient. Go to the following link if you want to see for yourself:
http://n.neurology.org/content/early/2014/08/06/WNL.0000000000000755.short
I want to emphasize that optimizing your vitamin D levels is one of the most important preventative health steps that you can take, to prevent Alzheimer's and dementia as well as many other conditions that I've written about in the past. However, the only way to know if you are deficient is to get tested. Did you know that we offer vitamin D testing through the office, that will give you the assurance that your vitamin D levels are optimal and where they need to be to lower your risk of dementia?
Interestingly, every patient that I have tested thus far has come back as being deficient! This has a lot to do with the northern climate that we live in and the fact that we don't get year-round sun exposure. The advantage for these tested patients is that they can now start to supplement for a period of time, and then we can re-test to make sure they have elevated their vitamin D levels and eliminated this health risk.
Another thing you should know is that there is no cure for Alzheimer's disease. There are drugs that can slow it's progression, but as with so many health problems that are presently incurable, preventing the onset needs to be your top priority.
Is it time to stop guessing, and get your vitamin D tested? Talk to the girls if you're ready to take this important health step.
Yours in Health,
Dr. Tim
Grace Chiropractic – 1-3230 Monarch Drive – 705-323-9100 – http://gracechiropractic.ca