A New Risk Factor for Alzheimer’s? [Shocking!]

Alzheimer’s is a disease that can wreak havoc on yours, and your loved one’s lives.

There’s no cure – so your best bet at fighting this disease is prevention.

That includes knowing the risk factors and taking action to LOWER your risk.

Which is why you need to know about a new risk factor and its connection to your brain health.

Here are the facts.

Being overweight is bad for your body. But did you know it’s bad for your brain, too?

In a recent study published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease Reports, researchers looked into the relationship between obesity and cognitive health.

They looked at the brain images of…

• Cognitively healthy people,
• People with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and
• Those with Alzheimer’s disease.

Then they looked at BMI and waist circumference to see if there was a connection between brain structures and weight.

People WITH Alzheimer’s disease generally have less gray matter volume, reduced white matter integrity, and reduced blood flow in the brain.

This reduces neural connections, which results in a loss of brain function.

The results showed a clear connection between BMI and gray matter volume—but not in the way you’d expect.

In people with Alzheimer’s disease, those with a higher BMI, but still in the healthy range, had higher levels of gray matter.

This group also had good blood flow in the brain.

This showed that having a healthy amount of body fat can help PRESERVE the gray matter that would otherwise break down in people with dementia.

This is critical information, since people with dementia often experience dramatic weight loss.

So, taking steps to help maintain a healthy weight could go a long way toward slowing the progression of the disease.

That was the first major finding.

The second finding was that cognitively healthy people and those with mild cognitive impairment had a negative connection between obesity and gray matter volume and blood flow.

In fact, in overweight folks, their brains looked like those of people with Alzheimer’s disease.

Now, this doesn’t mean that obesity causes dementia.

But it does suggest that being overweight when you’re still cognitively healthy could cause harmful changes in your brain that could be detrimental later in life.

In other words, the sooner you get to your ideal body weight—and stay there—the better.

 

P.S. The thought of Alzheimer’s can leave you feeling pretty hopeless. But I’m here to tell you that you can help STOP Alzheimer’s with these six easy steps. Click here to find out more.