Change Your Brain Every Day - What Is The Number One Brain Imaging Predictor for Alzheimer's Disease?

Episode Date: October 5, 2017

In the second installment of a 12-part series on Memory Rescue, Dr. Daniel Amen and Tana Amen talk about the first risk factor for memory loss from the BRIGHT MINDS mnemonic: Blood Flow. Learn how crucial proper blood flow is to your memory, brain, and overall health, as well as what you can do if your mind is headed to the dark place.

Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. I'm Dr. Daniel Amen. And I'm Tana Amen. Here we teach you how to win the fight for your brain to defeat anxiety, depression, memory loss, ADHD, and addictions. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is brought to you by Amen Clinics, where we've transformed lives for three decades using brain spec imaging to better target treatment and natural ways to heal the brain. For more information, visit amenclinics.com.

The Brain Warriors Way podcast is also brought to you by BrainMD, where we produce the highest quality nutraceutical products to support the health of your brain and body. For more information, visit brainmdhealth.com. Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Welcome back to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. We're in lesson two of memory rescue. And remember, the way you rescue your memory or make it stronger is we attack the 11 major risk factors that steal your mind. And we developed the mnemonic bright minds to help us remember all 11. And it starts with B is for blood flow. So why is it that you keep saying this is your favorite one?

Well, because it's involved in erections. It's involved in- Really? You just said that live. Like you just said that on the podcast, really? Seriously? It's involved in so much more than just sex. It could have been menstruation. It could have been cardio, like exercise. But no, you went

straight for erections. So B is for blood flow. What do guys think about with blood flow? You know, I used to say whatever's good for your heart is good for your brain because it's all about blood flow. And whatever's bad for your heart is bad for your brain. And then a number of years ago, about 10 years ago, even longer, when I wrote The Brain in Love, I went, oh, I missed something. Whatever is good for your heart is good for your brain. It's good for your genitals. And whatever is bad for your heart is bad for your brain, is bad for your genitals. And then I read this study from Harvard, 40% of 40 year olds have erectile dysfunction. Wow. And 70% of 70 year olds have erectile dysfunction.

And that horrified me. And at 63, probably 63% of 63-year-olds have erectile dysfunction. And I am not going to have any of this. This is not going to be dependent on the little blue pill to have a good time with my wife. But this is so important because if 40% of 40 year olds have erectile dysfunction, what that means is 40% of 40 year olds have brain dysfunction and 70% of 70 year olds have brain dysfunction. And there's something you can do about this. That's the thing. Hold on. People think it's normal. Okay.

So there's a lot of people who go, yeah, but that's normal. As I get older, you're not supposed to have sex as much. As I get older, I'm supposed to forget where I leave my keys. Right. That's the big belief. It's actually the big lie. It's the big lie. Right.

That it is normal. Right. But normal sucks. Healthy. Normal sucks. Let's just be honest. 50% of people 85 and older will be diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease or another form of dementia. So that means if you're blessed to live to 85 or beyond, you have a one in two chance of having lost your mind. I'm not okay with that. And you shouldn't be okay with it either. So how does somebody know if they have blood flow issues besides erectile dysfunction? Besides they're not having sex? Okay. Or they're dependent on the little blue pill. So they have a history of smoking.

They have a history of cardiovascular disease, including coronary artery disease, because cardiovascular, it's blood flow, right? Heart attacks, heart failure, heart arrhythmias, they're either prehypertensive or hypertensive. So having high blood pressure lowers blood flow to the brain. If they don't exercise or they don't exercise much, they're more likely to have decreased blood flow to the brain. So why is blood, you're a nurse, why is blood so important to every organ in the body, especially one that's so metabolically active? Well, lots of reasons. Like the brain. It takes nutrients. It helps detox. I mean, there's a lot of reasons. Okay. So it brings nutrition. Oxygen.

Brings oxygen, brings sugar, vitamins. And just as important, people don't understand this, just as important, blood takes away the toxic byproducts that build up in your cells. So if you limit blood flow, you are increasing the toxic material in your body, particularly in your brain, and why your brain is so important. So the brain is only 2% of the body's weight, but it uses 20% of the blood flow, 20% of the oxygen in your body. So how do you know if you likely have vascular problems, blood flow problems in your brain? You have some of the risk factors like you smoked or you drank a lot of caffeine because caffeine decreases blood flow to the brain. And so we want people to love their blood flow. And how you improve this risk factor is you decrease anything that hurts it and you do things that help it. So for example, if you're not exercising, you change that and you put a regular exercise

in your life. If you have hypertension, you treat it. You get serious. Doesn't necessarily mean medicine. Weight loss can help it. Exercise can help it. A lot of natural things you can do, eating the right foods, moving your body more. Lots of things you can do. Magnesium can help. Because I mean, if you really, really have to, you know, there are some people who just have to take blood pressure medication. It kind of sucks.

Right. But you have to do it. Right, when I was having heart rate issues with the thyroid, I got to tell you, I fell asleep at a stop sign taking that stuff because it just makes you wacky, wonky. It's terrible. More wacky than normal? Much more wacky, wonky than normal. No, less wonky than normal because I was so tired all the time.

It was terrible. So I would rather do the natural things. Um, so natural things if you can, but if you can't, um, having high blood pressure puts you at risk for stroke and having a stroke increases your risk of dementia 10 times. So it't want that. So it's really critical. And why do you keep saying take up racket sports? You need to exercise more. I take like, like it bugs me because I do karate and I love karate. I don't let people hit me in the head. I'm going to be clear.

I love it. Complex moves, both sides of the body. So I'm a huge fan of martial arts if there's no head injuries involved. Like there's nothing that feels better than hitting things. There's a study of 88,000 people showing who had the best cognitive function with age. And it was not football players.

They were on the bottom of the list. It was not soccer players. They were on the bottom of the list. It was not soccer players. They were on the bottom of the list. It was actually not even runners. Second were swimmers. Not that many had injuries in swimming. The first with cognitive function, the best was people who played racquet sports.

Let me finish. Let me answer the question. The reason I believe is when you play a racket sport it's a highly uh it's it's a coordination exercise at high speed and i play table tennis i play about three times a week and i just played last night and it's so good because I beat my coach which does not happen often and you have to think about the spin on the ball while you get your feet and hands going in the right direction and it's a cerebellar exercise so for those people don't know the cerebellum's in the back bottom part of your brain it's only 10 of the brain's volume but uses 50 of the brain's neurons and coordination exercises including martial arts uh but the one in the study was racket sports. The coordination exercises activate the cerebellum. And when you activate the

cerebellum, you turn on the frontal lobes, which help you with things like forethought, judgment, impulse, control. So it's really helpful. Okay. So I would never take anything away from that because everything you said makes total sense. But I did my thesis for my black belt on obviously on the benefits of martial arts. There were 126 studies, 126 studies showing the benefits of martial arts under certain circumstances, under certain conditions for things like autism, ADD, um, uh, not only issues like problems with kids who were getting bad grades because of focus, but also behavioral disorders. 126 studies. Now, what it was dependent upon was the actual dojo where they study. Because if it was just a mixed martial arts place where they were just teaching

them how to fight and get their heads bashed in, that obviously was bad. But if they were focused on tradition, things like katas, the reason why it's really good for kids with autism and ADD is because that takes repetition, complex moves, both sides of the body. So the cerebellum was involved. And so it's really good for you. So yes. And I'm a huge fan. I recommend it. And nothing feels better than hitting something. My patients just don't get hit back because Right. Because that's bad for your brain. It feels really bad. All right.

So let's get you 10 tips to increase blood flow to your brain. One of the risk factors we didn't talk about was dehydration. Because blood is mostly water. And so if you're dehydrated, that will hurt you as well. So tip number one, focus on drinking more water. So eight glasses, you know, about eight ounces a day is a good target for most people to hit. Avoid caffeine and nicotine. Both constrict blood flow to the brain. Now, you know, full disclosure, I make you a cappuccino every morning. Right. But it's a quarter caff.

It's a quarter of caffeine. So I take half caff coffee, mix it with an equal amount of unsweetened almond milk, a little chocolate and pumpkin flavored stevia, pumpkin spice, put it in a blender, frost like crazy. It's amazing. It's on my website, tannayman.com, or it's in the Brain Warriors by Cookbook. It's awesome. And so a little bit of caffeine a day, not a big deal, more than 150 milligrams, so a cup and a half a day, it can be a problem. Nicotine, you need to just stop it. It prematurely ages every organ in your body. Exercise, particularly martial arts, if you don't have a head injury or racket sports, have a small piece of sugar-free dark chocolate. And at BrainMD Health, we actually make Brain in Love and Brain on Joy, which are just amazing dark chocolate.

And the reason we make that, it's a symbol that getting well is about abundance. It's never about deprivation. And it tastes awesome. Um, Genco Biloba is, uh, Genco Biloba and Venpocitin are two supplements that we have seen increase blood flow to the brain. We're huge fans of those supplements. And maybe you can talk about pepper. Yes. So cayenne pepper, not only is good for your metabolism, it's also good for detoxing and

blood flow. Um, one thing that I really like to do the way that I add this besides to food, some people don't really love cayenne pepper on everything, but I really do like it either in my tea or sometimes what we do actually almost every morning, Chloe and I will have our warm lemon water with ginger, fresh. We just shave a little bit of fresh ginger in it and we add cayenne pepper to it. It actually gives it that little spicy taste. I really like it, actually. Or I'll put it in my tea at night. So cayenne pepper is really great.

And other foods include beets. We've got a recipe for beet street tacos. It's really yummy. So beets have a low glycemic index, which means even though they have sugar in them, they don't raise your blood sugar. They're very low glycemic load. They're very high in fiber and increased blood flow. So I always know when you feed me beets, you're...

See, it always boils down to sex. What is that? So I actually put beets, I'll put one, like a half of a fresh beet in my green juice. I'll do a little bit of beet juice in my green juice. In addition, green leafy vegetables have nutrients in it that help raise blood flow. You're going to find green leafy vegetables help with virtually all of the 11 major risk factors that steal your mind. Pumpkin seeds increase magnesium, but they also increase dopamine, which helps boost blood flow to the prefrontal cortex. So if you're like me and you have that little bit of brain fog that you need to like...

Some pumpkin seeds can be really helpful. Yeah, exercise, pumpkin seeds, green tea. And green tea is the last thing to think about. So avoid anything that hurts blood flow to your brain. So a lot of times people have heard me talk about brain envy. You know, Freud was wrong. Penis envy is not, since we're into sex today, penis envy is not the cause of most of your neuroses. We want people to develop brain envy, to fall in love with their brain. Likely, I want you to have blood flow envy. I'm beginning to think Freud was right.

We want you to have blood flow envy and the strategy to get your memory as sharp as it can be or to get it back if it's headed to the dark place. Avoid anything that hurts blood flow. Do things that help it. Hydration, avoiding caffeine and nicotine, racket sports, martial arts,

dancing would be another coordination exercise, dark chocolate, ginkgo or vimpocetine, foods like cayenne pepper, beets, green leafy vegetables, pumpkin seeds, and decaffeinated green tea. You're listening to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. When we come back, we're going to talk about retirement and aging not good for your brain. Thank you for listening to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Go to iTunes and leave a review, and you'll automatically be entered into a drawing to get a free signed copy of the Brain Warriors Way and the Brain Warriors Way cookbook we give away every month. into a drawing to get a free signed copy of The Brain Warrior's Way and The Brain Warrior's Way cookbook we give away every month.