Alzheimer’s disease is a major concern among older adults and a growing social problem in the United States, with 1 in 10 adults over the age of 45 reporting difficulty with memory or thinking. Currently, more than 6 million Americans are affected by Alzheimer’s disease, and twice as many will be affected by the year 2050. Fear of dementia has increased public demand for better treatments and spurred a much-needed increase in funding funds for Alzheimer’s disease research that will hopefully lead to a cure for this devastating disease.
Last year, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Biogen’s controversial new Alzheimer’s drug, aducanumab, marketed as Aduhelm, despite a lack of clear evidence of its safety and benefits. After much scrutiny and a decision by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid to severely limit coverage for the treatment, the company declared the drug a commercial failure. Last week, Biogen announced promising results from a second drug, lecanemab, which appears slightly safer and more effective. Whether the FDA will approve lecanemab remains to be seen.
As the search for a blockbuster drug for Alzheimer’s disease continues, we must turn our attention to the strong evidence that relatively simple strategies to improve brain health are already known to reduce the risk of developing this dreaded condition. Lifestyle modifications, such as quitting smoking, increasing physical activity, and treating depression, hearing loss, and high blood pressure, are highly beneficial in preserving brain health and are highly feasible with current treatment approaches. In 2020, an international panel of experts concluded that up to 40% of all dementia cases worldwide could be significantly delayed or even prevented by addressing these modifiable risk factors. Hearing loss, for example, is widespread among older adults and is one of the strongest risk factors for cognitive decline. It can also be easily addressed with hearing aids, which have recently become available without a prescription. More recently, psychosocial factors such as depression, social isolation, and sedentary lifestyle, each more common during and since the COVID-19 pandemic, have been recognized as important risk factors for dementia. These can be treated with psychotherapy, medications, social interactions, and physical activity.
Clinical trials of aerobic exercise, nutritional supplementation, and cognitive rehabilitation are currently underway and may offer low-risk, cost-effective strategies to decrease the risk of dementia in older adults. A positive aspect of this approach is that lifestyle interventions often address multiple risk factors, leading to additional benefits. For example, increasing physical activity through regular exercise not only lowers blood pressure, but also helps relieve depression and anxiety and improves other risk factors for dementia, such as type 2 diabetes and obesity.
Research shows us that many of the factors that increase our risk of Alzheimer’s disease can be treated with great benefit. As we continue to learn and discover new information about how to fight and cure this devastating disease, it’s time we all raised our awareness of lifestyle choices and changes we can make right away to lower our risk and decrease the number of people and families that will be affected by this disease. Ask your health care providers to suggest which of these lifestyle changes will benefit you and your loved ones the most.
Christopher Martens, Ph.D, is an assistant professor of kinesiology and applied physiology at the University of Delaware and director of the Delaware Cognitive Aging Research Center, which focuses on conducting clinical trials aimed at addressing modifiable disease risk factors. Alzheimer’s and related diseases. James Ellison, MD, MPH, is the Swank Foundation Chair of Memory Care and Geriatrics at ChristianaCare in Wilmington Delaware and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry and Neurology.
Source: news.google.com