Brain Age

I’ve always been told that we do not use our brains to it’s full capacity. The research says we should do things to encourage our brain to learn new things because its’ a muscle that needs to be worked. As we get older, we sometimes stop trying to learn new things and become complacent in just “being.” It has been proven that working crossword puzzles or learning a new language actually helps keep dementia away.

A British study believes that an “older” mind is linked to signs of physical and mental problems. This brain age may help to predict when you’ll die if the brain ages faster than normal. This causes people whose brain ages faster than normal to have a heightened risk for brain disease and impairment.

The authors are hoping that the findings might introduce a way to use imaging of the brain as a biomarker and a way to measure a biological condition or process. They could potentially identify those at risk of age-associated health problems years before their symptoms appear. They might then be used as outcome measures in trials of therapeutics aimed at delaying the onset of age-related disease.

Researchers conducted brain scans of nearly 700 adults in Scotland who were born in 1936. The adults whose brains appeared older than their chronological age when the imaging scans were done, tended to have weaker grips, poorer lung function, slower walking speed and more wear and tear on their bodies.

These patients were also worse at solving new problems and their performances were poorer when applying logic and identifying patterns, compared to those whose brain age matched their actual age.

They further believe that it was possible to use this brain scan to establish if a 73 year old’s brain-predicted age would determine whether that person would die by the age of 80.

It was concluded that by combining brain-predicted age with certain DNA factors of aging if would further improve the predictions about a person’s risk of death.

These findings were published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry. They believe the research demonstrates that by combining distinct measures of biological aging it further helps to also determine risk of age-related deterioration and death. I certainly wouldn’t want to know when my time was up but it would sure be great if this would help to create a process whereby Alzheimer’s and dementia could be curtailed before any symptoms were noticeable.

Dr Fredda Branyon