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Successful Aging: Strategies to Help Maintain and Nurture a Healthy Brain
When it comes to aging, is there anything to look forward to from a neurocognitive perspective?
What can we do to protect our brains from cognitive and functional decline?
Here, Helen Lavretksy speaks about one of her favorite subjects – healthy, happy, and graceful aging. Dr Lavretsky is a geriatric psychiatrist and Professor in the department of psychiatry at UCLA. She directs the Late Life Mood, Stress, and Wellness Research Program at the Semel Institute at UCLA. She is coeditor of the newly published Late Life Mood Disorders—a comprehensive review of the current research advances in late life mood disorders.
Globally, many societies are being affected in major economic and social ways in countries where the population is aging rapidly, such as Japan (23% over 65), Germany (20.5%), Italy (20.4%), and the US (13%). The countries that show that fastest rate of change in population age, in order, are Iran, Vietnam, Mexico, India, and South Korea. The obvious consequences are a shrinking labor force and shifting of a nation’s wealth to health care.
. In general, as we age, our bodies and brain experience changes: some are positive -- and some are not so much. Although some cognitive functions such as memory, reasoning, and complex problem solving can decline with age, the National Institute of Aging states that approximately 87% of those age 65 years and older are cognitively healthy.
Full story of healthy aging at Psychiatric Times
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Sex lives and traumatic brain injury
For the more than 3 million Americans living with traumatic brain injury, there is often an unspoken problem: many suffer from sexual dysfunction, something that is easily overlooked as patients struggle with overwhelming physical and emotional issues that can last for years, new research has found.
The sexual difficulties usually become most apparent about six months after the injury and, if left unaddressed, worsen with time, said study author Jhon Alexander Moreno, a researcher in neuropsychology at the University of Montreal.
The cause of the injury can also influence whether a person will struggle with sexual problems, Moreno said. "The psychological stressors that an athlete or a soldier faces are quite different, so a traumatic brain injury with the same severity can lead to different sexual difficulties."
Full story of sex and brain injuries at Health 24
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Mindfulness Therapy Reduces Depressive Symptoms in TBI
Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) reduces symptoms of depression in individuals with traumatic brain injury (TBI), new research suggests.
A randomized controlled trial conducted by investigators at Lakehead University and St. Joseph's Care Group in Thunder Bay, Canada, showed that compared with a wait-list control group, the MBCT group experienced a significantly greater reduction in total and somatic depressive symptoms.
The findings were presented here at EPA 2013: 21st European Congress of Psychiatry.
According to study investigator Michel Bédard, PhD, TBI can be a life-changing event: Depression is common, and pharmacologic and other interventions may not relieve depressive symptoms.
Full story of therapy for TBI at Medscape Today
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Should science on brain injury inspire a ban on boxing?
When Ireland's Katie Taylor was taking hits and striking blows for boxing's Olympic debut in an east London ring last year, John Hardy did not want to look.
To this leading neuroscientist and molecular biologist, a boxing bout is little more than a session of mutual brain injury. He was horrified to see women boxing at Olympic level for the first time at the London 2012 Games.
"We shouldn't get our fun out of watching people inflict brain damage on each other," said Hardy, who is chair of Molecular Biology of Neurological Disease at University College London's Institute of Neurology. "To me as a neuroscientist it's almost surreal."
Hardy, whose research work focuses on Alzheimer's and other types of dementia, said having women in an Olympic boxing ring was "a terrible thing" - not because he thinks women should not compete alongside men in sport, but because women boxing simply meant more people inflicting more damage on more brains.
That, in turn, was highly likely to mean more people suffering the devastating, incurable symptoms of brain diseases such as Alzheimer's.
Full story of brain injuries and boxing at Yahoo Sports
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Concussions: Even one can change the brain, study finds
Even a single concussion appears to cause changes in the structure of the brain that may make cognitive problems and depression a higher likelihood, a new study has found.
The study, which used magnetic resonance imaging to compare healthy subjects' brains with those of patients a year after a mild traumatic brain injury, indicated that those with such injuries had shrinkage in brain regions that are key to memory, executive function and mood regulation.
The study, published online in the journal Radiology on Tuesday, is the first to show that even a single concussion can leave measurable scars on the brain. It used three-dimensional MRI scanning to measure the brain volume of 28 recent concussion victims and 22 matched controls. A year later, researchers conducted the same scans of 19 patients with mild traumatic brain injuries and 12 of a healthy control group.
Full story of concussions and the brain at the Los Angeles Times
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New clues to chronic fatigue syndrome
The brains of patients with chronic fatigue syndrome -- an often misunderstood condition marked by unexplained, incapacitating exhaustion -- don't respond to rewards in the same way as the brains of healthy people do, a new study suggests.
Researchers performed functional MRI scans on the brains of 18 people with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and 41 healthy volunteers, finding that those with chronic fatigue experienced significantly less change in blood flow to the basal ganglia in response to winning a simple card game meant to stimulate feelings of reward.
Previous research has shown that the basal ganglia, a region at the base of the brain associated with motor activity and motivation, is affected in diseases associated with fatigue. Participants with the most severe chronic fatigue had the smallest change in basal ganglia activity, the study showed.
Full story of chronic fatigue at Fox 18 Quad Cities
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