Memory Key Newsletter

There’s a lot of research about memory, and although I winnow out the material, there’s still an awful lot I send out and it can be quite overwhelming to deal with. I was recently asked to distil the essence of all this knowledge and find the bottom line for older adults — namely, what should a person in her sixties be doing to retard the inevitable memory loss due to advancing years. I thought the answer to this question would be of interest to many of my subscribers, and so I have chosen to answer it publicly here.

Probably the most important thing older adults should be doing is regular exercise (actually this is probably the most important thing for all ages!). Brisk walking is the type of exercise most supported by research, though this is partly because it’s the one most looked at. But it does seem likely that it is important that the exercise be aerobic, given the general mantra you may like to inscribe on your heart: What’s good for the heart is good for the brain. So any advice you may have received about cardiovascular fitness is likely to also be of benefit to your brain.

There is less research, as I’ve said, on other forms of exercise, but there is some suggestion that exercise that promotes strength, balance and coordination, is also helpful. Although it’s not yet understood, there does seem to be some connection between balance & coordination and cognitive function in seniors.

Exercise of all kinds is also stress reducing, and evidence is accumulating that stress worsens cognitive function, and that seniors may be particularly vulnerable to this effect (quite probably for no more profound reason than that as we get older we operate closer to the edge, as it were, and have less reserve to protect us against factors that impair cognitive function).

Perhaps for these latter two reasons, there is some evidence that Tai chi is beneficial to cognitive function in seniors, possibly even more than brisk walking.

My own recommendation would be, if you can, to do both: regular brisk walking and Tai chi. These should be considered as indicative however. If other activities are more to your liking, go with the ones you enjoy and are capable of. The important thing is that you spend regular and sufficient time and effort on them.

One of the advantages of Tai chi for older adults is that it is a gentler exercise than most, and so suitable for those who might be incapable of more vigorous exercise. The latest research (that I mentioned in the last news report) suggests that older adults can also compensate for being less able to do physical exercise with mental exercise. So while ideally you spend regular time engaged in both types of pursuit, the less you can do of the physical, the more time you should spend on the mental.

Mental stimulation is of course the other very important factor in reducing cognitive decline, and the only reason I put physical exercise first is because I assume anyone reading me is already regularly engaged in mental activities!

There are two main aspects to mental exercise. The first is a general one — any activity that challenges your brain and keeps it flexible is doing good. The second is more specific — if you want to improve your cognitive abilities in any particular area, you need to work on tasks in that area. Physical exercise and mental stimulation are broad strategies that, if undertaken at sufficient levels of intensity, will help you grow new brain cells. But to arrest the decline most of us experience in our various tasks, you need to focus on these tasks and learn (and practice) better strategies for dealing with them.

The third important factor is sleep. As we grow older, most of us do develop sleep problems of one kind or another, and most of us probably accept it as part of growing older. But don’t dismiss it so easily. Even if you think you’re getting an adequate number of hours sleep, light, broken sleep is likely to be impairing your cognitive function. It’s worth trying to ensure you have a better night’s sleep. And if all the usual advice about achieving this doesn’t work for you, I recommend meditation. Even if it doesn’t improve your sleep, there’s some evidence that regular meditation helps compensate for lack of sleep.

The fourth factor is diet. There are two aspects to why diet is so important to seniors. The first is the one I mentioned earlier — we are simply more vulnerable to impairing factors as we age. Thus, although a young person can get away with an unhealthy diet, eventually their body is going to send them the message that enough is enough (and we’re not only talking about the extremes here — you don’t have to be living on junk food to be eating an unhealthy diet). The second reason is that, for several different reasons, older people often develop diets that are deficient in protein and necessary vitamins and minerals. One of the main reasons is that appetite tends to decrease — when you’re eating less, it’s vitally important that what you eat contains the type of stuff you need.

Mainly that means fruit and vegetables! though vitamin B12 deficiency is also common in seniors and can have a big impact on cognition. Vitamin B12 is found in meat, fish, poultry, eggs, and dairy products.

The big thing with vegetables is probably mainly in their role as antioxidants, though folate (found in dark green leafy vegetables and citrus) is also important. With fruit, the main thing may well be the flavonoids in them. The fruit for which the most evidence points to its cognitive benefit is blueberries, but other fruit in that red-purple-black range may very well be of equal benefit. To benefit from these, they do have to be eaten regularly and in sufficient quantities.

The other type of food for which there is an increasing amount of evidence is omega-3 oils.

Now I haven’t mentioned supplements, and that is because, like many other substances (particular foods, coffee, tea, alcohol, various herbs, etc), the evidence is not yet as clear as it is with the factors I have mentioned. Moreover, I personally feel that one should do everything else right before trying what are more extreme remedies. So this, in a nutshell, is my advice:

· Regular exercise

· Regular mental exercise

· Practicing specific strategies for those tasks you want to do well at

· Seek restful sleep

· Reduce stress

· Follow a healthy diet that supplies plenty of B12, antioxidants, and important flavonoids.

And while all that may seem no more than everyone advises for health, bear in mind this: these are all factors which reasonably convincing evidence finds are important for reducing or even preventing age-related cognitive decline.

(Note that my latest blog entry discusses studies suggesting that two of these factors, sleep and stress, may be of particular importance for women.)

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AGE ACTIVATED ATTENTION DEFICIT DISORDER

I was recently sent one of those pass-it-on, this will amuse you, emails. I can’t credit the source, because who knows where it started. But it is very timely, so I thought I would share it with you. Here it is:

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Recently, I was diagnosed with A.A.A.D.D. - Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder. This is how it manifests:

I decide to water my garden. As I turn on the hose in the driveway, I look over at my car and decide it needs washing.

As I start toward the garage, I notice mail on the porch table that I brought up from the mail box earlier.

I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car.

I lay my car keys on the table, put the junk mail in the garbage can under the table, and notice that the can is full.

So, I decide to put the bills back on the table and take out the garbage first. But then I think, since I'm going to be near the mailbox when I take out the garbage anyway, I may as well pay the bills first.

I take my cheque book off the table, and see that there is only one cheque left. My extra cheques are in my desk in the study, so I go inside the house to my desk where I find the can of Coke I'd been drinking.

I'm going to look for my cheques, but first I need to push the Coke aside so that I don't accidentally knock it over. The Coke is getting warm, and I decide to put it in the refrigerator to keep it cold.

As I head toward the kitchen with the Coke, a vase of flowers on the counter catches my eye - they need water.

I put the Coke on the counter and discover my reading glasses that I've been searching for all morning.

I decide I better put them back on my desk, but first I'm going to water the flowers. I set the glasses back down on the counter, fill a container with water and suddenly spot the TV remote. Someone left it on the kitchen table.

I realize that tonight when we go to watch TV, I'll be looking for the remote, but I won't remember that it's on the kitchen table, so I decide to put it back in the den where it belongs, but first I'll water the flowers.

I pour some water in the flowers, but quite a bit of it spills on the floor. So, I set the remote back on the table, get some towels and wipe up the spill. Then, I head down the hall trying to remember what I was planning to do.

At the end of the day:

· the car isn't washed

· the bills aren't paid

· there is a warm can of Coke sitting on the counter

· the flowers don't have enough water,

· there is still only 1 cheque in my cheque book,

· I can't find the remote,

· I can't find my glasses,

· and I don't remember what I did with the car keys.

Then, when I try to figure out why nothing got done today, I'm really baffled because I know I was busy all day, and I'm really tired.

I realize this is a serious problem, and I'll try to get some help for it, but first I'll check my e-mail...

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It’s funny because it’s so true. As I’ve said before, one of the big problems that tends to afflict us as we age is an increasing inability to tune out distraction. But there is a remedy, and mostly it comes down to being constantly conscious of this problem, and its implications. Remember that your working memory capacity — how much you can hold in conscious awareness — is very very small, and each new item you try and put in is going to bump another one out.

I talk more about this in my book Remembering Intentions, but the essence of the advice is that you stop believing you can hold two intentions in your mind at one time and always, always, provide yourself with a reminder (an object or a note) for the task(s) you are not currently in the middle of.

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