US researchers linked to Harvard University found older women who ate lots of food high in saturated fats had worse memories than others.
By contrast, those who ate more monounsaturated fats – found in olive oil, sunflower oil, seeds, nuts and avocados – had better memories.
Dr Oliva Okereke, from the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Mass., which is affiliated to Harvard Medical School, said: “When looking at changes in cognitive function, what we found is that the total amount of fat intake did not really matter, but the type of fat did.”
An experimental form of gene therapy has given hope of a significant advance in the treatment of dementia.
The therapy, in which a nerve growth factor delayed the loss of brain cells, led to increased metabolic activity in the brain of Alzheimer’s sufferers and a reduction in the decline of cognitive functions.
Though the study was small, the subjects seemed to show indications of a reduction in the advancement of their disease, according to Prof Mark Tuszynski of the University of California, San Diego, the study’s principal investigator.
“Please wear a tux,” I said over the phone to Don, the classical violinist I was hiring to play a special concert for my Romanian soul mate, Ed, in his room at the Alois Alzheimer Center in Cincinnati. I described Ed’s dementia to Don, adding that Ed had been a college professor who loved classical “moo-sic.”
Alzheimer’s is thought of as a disease of the elderly. But the early-onset form of the disease can wreak havoc for young people and their families.
On a fall day in Westbury, New York state, Brandon Henley, 18, hastily opens the front door of his small house. The nurse his mother has been calling all day has finally arrived to deliver urgently needed anti-seizure medicine.
Susan Draddy had a unique idea to help her mother cope withAlzheimer’s disease.
