Can food prevent dementia?

Info about Dementia

Dementia is the medical problem, which can be described asthe loss of different intellectual faculties and memory. This problem canseverely affect normal occupational and social activities of the patients, andthey may start to do some unusual and even weird things. For people sufferingfrom dementia, normal everyday life may become compromised and they might needhome and medical help, in order to function properly.

In some cases, dementia is caused by vascular problems orsome injury or trauma to the brain. Vascular problems may seriously affect theblood flow and therefore cause impairment of memory and other difficulties relatedto dementia. Also, injury to the brain or trauma doesn’t have to provokedementia right away, but it may happen years later in the life.

Alzheimer’s disease or simply AD is probably the bestresearches type of dementia. In patients suffering from this disease, there issome abnormal accumulation of proteins in the brain and these plaques andtangles affect normal function of the brain cells. Certain regions of the brainare first to be affected by these structural changes and these are usuallyareas responsible for memory and learning. Because of that, people with ADusually experience memory impairment as the first sign of the disease.

Food We Eat and Brain Functions

According to some studies, the food we eat whole our lifecan determine possibility of brain health at older age. Mediterranean diet hasbeen found to be especially beneficial, and people eating this type of food areproven to have healthier body and brain even as they get old. In this diet,proteins usually (or at least mainly) come from the fish, and there are plentyof fruits, vegetables and legumes used. These people use mostly olive oil,which makes their diet rich in monounsaturated fat.

Groups of people eating in accordance with Mediterraneandiet all their life have been proven to have much lesser incidence of Alzheimer’sdisease, and those who started this diet with diagnosed AD experience slowerthan usual progression of the disease.

Older people should eat variety of foods to prevent various medicalproblems that may arise. They should take food rich in vitamin B complex, whichmay improve their cognitive functions. These are foods like: eggs, beef,salmon, broccoli, spinach, romaine lettuce, red peppers, peanuts and asparagus.Beta carotene can also positively affect memory and cognition in some long termstudies. Garlic and aged garlic extract, as well as the apples have also beenproven to stop the decline of the brain.

Eating fish regularly or using fish oil supplements can decreasethe risk of AD for 35%. Choose fish that does not accumulate mercury in thebody and try to avoid shark, swordfish, king mackerel tilefish and snapper.