2024-05-04 15:22:04
According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 5.8 million people have Alzheimer’s disease. Americans. This progressive disease is the most common form of dementia, characterized by memory loss and cognitive decline in areas of the brain involved in thinking, memory and language.
Scientists believe that Alzheimer’s disease is caused by abnormal protein build-up in and around brain cells, but exactly what causes this build-up is still unclear. However, it is known that the risk of developing Alzheimer’s depends on many genetic and environmental factors. Among the latter are alcohol consumption and stress.
“Alcohol consumption and chronic stress will have a synergistic effect on the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and overall cognitive decline,” says Nikki Crowley, director of the Pennsylvania State Neuroscience Institute and associate professor of biology. “This means that when a person experiences both high stress and alcohol consumption, the combination of these two factors has a greater effect on their risk of Alzheimer’s disease and cognitive decline.”
Crowley and her colleagues recently published a meta-analysis of studies on this synergistic relationship žurnale „Neurobiology of Stress“.
“Our laboratory work, using animal models that allow us to study the mechanism of these changes in the brain very quickly, shows that even moderate alcohol consumption in middle age can cause long-term changes in the brain that are unlikely to return to the original trajectory,” says N. Crowley.
In particular, alcohol consumption can cause changes in glutamate signaling, which plays an important role in shaping our learning and memory processes. Interestingly, the same changes are observed during cognitive decline.
How can you reduce your risk of Alzheimer’s disease?
“The US National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism doesn’t have a safe amount of alcohol to drink, but they do have some guidelines to help you make healthy choices, recommending less than two units of alcohol per day for men and one unit per day for women. However, any alcohol consumption is associated with risk, says N. Crowley. “If you have a family history of alcohol use disorders, Alzheimer’s disease or similar dementias, you may want to talk to your family doctor about whether it would be best for you to live without drinking alcohol at all.”
N. Crowley recommends not only reducing the amount of alcohol, but also changing other lifestyle factors that influence the increase in the risk of Alzheimer’s. She says that “addressing any chronic health problems, improving diet, getting more physical activity and sleep, and limiting alcohol and tobacco use will all have positive effects.”
Parenting page “Newsweek”.
2024-05-04 15:22:04