Keeping mentally alive

DURING a breakfast meeting with fellow journalists Giovannie Va-ay and Eufemia Pedregosa, they asked me why I was still writing for a living at age 76.

“I still write to eat,” I quipped, “and to stay sane.”

Our chit-chat segued into a close friend who had developed Alzheimer’s disease and so had to stay at home.

“I can only presume his memory deteriorated after retirement from his busy government post,” I said. “You must have heard of the saying, ‘Use it or lose it.’”

Alzheimer’s disease is a progressive brain disorder and the most serious type of dementia that gradually destroys memory, thinking and basic daily functions.

Based on research studies, a chronically “idle” or mentally inactive mind is more prone to developing Alzheimer’s disease symptoms.

As published in Neurology, a medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology, adults who actively read, write or learn new skills across their lifespan show a dramatically slower decline in memory and thinking. An idle mind could be a breeding ground for either amnesia or Alzheimer’s disease.

My regular readers must have noticed my tendency to share events from the past, including childhood, as long as they are relevant to the topic. I believe that our brain is just like a muscle that needs constant stretching and flexing to stay in shape.

Indeed, a journalist-for-life has the advantage of keeping one’s brain always busy recovering forgotten words. These days, there’s always a dictionary and a thesaurus accessible on the internet.

Nevertheless, being unusually forgetful, I consulted my sister Azucena, a physician, on what drugs to take to prevent Alzheimer’s disease (AD). I had heard about such anti-AD drugs as Alzhemed and Flurizan.

It was reassuring to hear from her the usual phrase, “Senior moments.”

“Just eat an apple a day,” she advised.

I thought she was paraphrasing a familiar quotation until she handed me a printed study on the memory-enhancing effects of apples done by a team of medical professors at the University of Massachusetts. The study was originally published in the American Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease (AD).

The team, led by Dr. Thomas Shea, wrapped up its study with the conclusion that apples may really have huge health benefits, especially for folks fighting the effects of AD.

Dr. Shea’s research team studied 21 patients between the ages of 72 and 93 who had moderate-to-severe AD. He gave them two four-ounce glasses of apple juice each day for a month. After just 30 days, his team noted major changes in mood and behavior. Changes included improvements in anxiety, depression and delusion.

“In addition to changes in memory, there’s a change in mood that often accompanies AD,” wrote Dr. Shea. “We found that people receiving apple juice displayed fewer of the symptoms. It kept their minds functioning at their best.”

Dr. Shea’s study also included testing mice in a series of maze trials. He gave them the equivalent of two glasses of apple juice each day for 30 days. He then put them through a series of traditional tests involving repetitive entries and exits through a maze together with “un-appled” mice. The mice that drank apple juice took less time to memorize the right exit points.

The results backed up his theory. The mice produced less “beta amyloid” — the protein fragment that produces “senile plaques” — which are often found in the brains of people with AD.

His team also proved beyond doubt that pure apple juice — not the synthetic canned or bottled kind — increases the production of acetylcholine, a brain transmitter that helps slow the mental decline of people with AD.