This issue is dedicated to the brain/mind. As the ancients knew, “mente sana in corpore sano.” Brain health, like everything else, is based on good activity and good food. The latter is critical for the brain-gut connection, which revolves around the health of the microbiome.
Hugo Rodier, MD
Some key brain functions may improve in people as they age
“HealthDay (8/19, Thompson) reports research indicates that “some key brain functions can improve in people as they age, researchers” concluded after examining “three components of mental ability in a group of more than 700 Taiwanese people between 58 and 98 years of age,” including “alerting, the enhanced vigilance that triggers one’s attention to incoming information; orienting, the ability to shift brain resources to a particular location in our environment,” and “executive inhibition, the ability to ignore distractions to focus on what’s important.” The study revealed that with “increasing age, many people appear to get better at focusing on important matters and ignoring distractions – tasks that support other critical brain functions like memory, decision making and self-control.” The findings were published online in the journal Nature Human Behavior.”
Comment: it’s not all downhill. Your odds of getting “old-timers” disease are a lot lower if you do optimize your lifestyle.
Mentally stimulating jobs lower dementia risk later in life
Healio Minute, August 27, 2021
“Results from a multicohort study of individuals in the U.S., U.K. and Europe revealed that people with high cognitively stimulating jobs were less likely to develop dementia in old age than those with low stimulating jobs. “It was surprising to see such a clear association between mental stimulation in the workplace and dementia risk when previous studies on cognitively stimulating leisure activities and dementia have reported null findings,” Mika Kivimaki, PhD, a professor in the department of epidemiology and public health at University College London, told Healio Primary Care. “The explanation could be that exposure to cognitive stimulation at work typically lasts considerably longer than cognitively stimulating hobbies.”
Comment: don’t retire. If you must, find some other activity to keep you busy. Your wife may not like you around the house all the time.
The gut microbiome’s impact on psychiatric disorders
Healio Minute, August 25, 2021
“Recent research has supported the theory of a connection between the gut and brain. Bacteria in the gut can impact mood, postpartum conditions, autism and stress. Patients with psychiatric disorders including depression, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia compared with those without these conditions have significantly different gut microbiomes.” Healio Gastroenterology spoke with Sabine Hazan, MD, creator of ProgenaBiome and founder of Ventura clinical trials, about her recent research in the gut-brain connection and the role the gut microbiome plays in overall heath. “Every disease begins in the gut. Hippocrates said it 2,500 years ago, and we’re proving it because we are seeing markers in the gut in every disease. So, it’s important to look at the microbiome. We are looking to include patients with an anxiety disorder or OCD to join our research. I am currently doing the study with University of California, Los Angeles.”
Comment: unfortunately, most people with mood disorders cannot overcome their sweet tooth, which perpetuate “dysbiosis,” an unbalanced microbiome.
Can microbes combat neurodegeneration?
J. Science 09 Jul 2021;373:172-173
“Recent evidence suggests that the human brain constantly communicates with the gut microbiome—an ecosystem of thousands of bacterial species that inhabit the gastrointestinal tract along a “microbiome-gut-brain axis.” Cross-talk on this axis can be mediated by small-molecular metabolites secreted by gut bacteria and absorbed into the blood stream. These metabolites can then access the central nervous system through the choroid plexus, where it is believed they reprogram transcriptional responses of brain cells. The gut microbiome responds quickly to environmental factors and represents a central component in their impact on the host’s physiology. Therefore, we hypothesized that gut bacteria influence Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis pathogenesis.”
Comment: patients with Lou Gehrig’s disease as well as Alzheimer’s disease and Multiple Sclerosis may see improvement by optimizing their microbiome. We may all lower our risk of getting these terrible diseases by keeping our gut bacteria happy with lots of veggies.
Diet quality, gut microbiota, and microRNAs associated with mild cognitive impairment in middle-aged and elderly Chinese population
The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 2021:114:429–440
“A better diet quality is associated with a lower risk of mild cognitive impairment, MCI, which may be mediated by the microbiota composition and miRNA expression. These findings suggest that diet, the gut microbiota, and miRNAs may serve as a combinatorial biomarker to identify MCI patients and provide new insight for the diagnosis and prevention of MCI.”
Comment: we hope that the brain-gut connection may also help in the treatment of MCI. Pharmaceuticals will try to cash in on this type of research. But the best, and cheapest, is to eat a diet high in PREBIOTICS. They are micronutrients, mostly I veggies, that support a good microbiome.
Gut microbiota underdeveloped in autism spectrum disorder
Healio Minute, August 4, 2021
“Novel bacterial markers predicted autism spectrum disorder in children and showed persistent underdevelopment of the gut microbiota among these children, according to data published in Gut. “The gut microbiota has been suggested to play a role in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We postulate that children with ASD harbor an altered developmental profile of the gut microbiota distinct from that of typically developing (TD) children,” Yating Wan, PhD, from the Center for Gut Microbiota Research, University of Hong Kong, and colleagues wrote. “Here, we aimed to characterize compositional and functional alterations in gut microbiome in association with age in children with ASD and to identify novel fecal bacterial markers for predicting ASD.”
“Wan and colleagues conducted deep metagenomic sequencing in fecal samples of 146 Chinese children, 72 with autism spectrum disorder and 74 typically developing children. The researchers compared gut microbial composition and functions between children with autism spectrum disorder and typically developing children. They identified candidate bacteria markers that they validated with metagenomic analysis. Investigators used a random forest model to analyze gut microbiota development regarding chronological age. “ASD and chronological age had the most significant and largest impacts on children’s fecal microbiome while diet showed no correlation,” the researchers wrote. “Children with ASD had significant alterations in fecal microbiome composition compared with TD children characterized by increased bacterial richness.”
Comment: this is old news, but the volume of research on this is high enough that families with ADD and Autistic children would do well to optimize their diet. It won’t work unless everyone under the same roof cooperates.
Consuming fermented foods may alter gut microbiome
“The New York Times (8/13, O’Connor) reported research indicates that consuming “fermented foods,” such as sauerkraut, kefir, kombucha, kimchi and yogurt, “may alter the makeup of the…gut microbiome” in addition to leading “to lower levels of body-wide inflammation.” The findings of the 36-participant study were published online in the journal Cell.”
Comment: they left out Tufu (soy). Make sure it is organic. And don’t pay attention to misinformed people who still rely on old, old data demonizing soy.
Dietary omega 3 fatty acids for migraine
BMJ 2021;374:n1535
“A diet rich in omega 3 (n-3) fatty acids reduces headache frequency compared with a diet with normal intake of omega 3 and omega 6 (n-6) fatty acids.6
Omega 3 and omega 6 fatty acids are precursors to oxylipins, which are involved in the regulation of pain and inflammation. Omega 3 fatty acid derivatives are associated with antinociceptive and anti-inflammatory effects, while oxylipins derived from omega 6 fatty acids worsen pain and provoke migraine in experimental models.”
Comment: the best omega 3 fatty acids are fish, avocados, olives and nuts. Animal fats are higher in Omega 6 fatty acids. Fats have a direct effect on the central and peripheral neurologic system because each neuron is sheathed in fat. Fatty acids also affect the microbiome. Remember that therein we find 2/3 of the immune system, which how bad fats trigger inflammatory changes throughout the body. In other words, inflammation begins in the gut.
