Tag Archives: Aging

A digital map of the ageing brain could aid the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative disorders in older people, a study suggests.

The atlas created using images from MRI scans of older people could aid diagnosis by comparing the patients’ scans with a detailed map of the healthy ageing brain.

Most existing MRI atlases are based on the brains of young and middle-aged people, which don’t reflect the normal changes that take place in the brain as we age, the team says. Researchers at the University of Edinburgh constructed a detailed atlas of the human brain using MRI scans from more than 130 healthy people aged 60 or over.

The team used their atlas to study brain scans taken of normal older subjects and those who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. The atlas was able to pinpoint changes in patients’ brain structure that can be an underlying sign of the condition, researchers say.

The study is published in the journal PLOS ONE.

Dr David Alexander Dickie, of The University of Edinburgh’s Brain Research Imaging Centre and SINAPSE, who was first author of the study, said: “We’re absolutely delighted with these preliminary results and that our brain MRI atlases may be used to support earlier diagnoses of diseases such as Alzheimer’s. Earlier diagnoses are currently our strongest defence against these devastating diseases and, while our work is preliminary and ongoing, digital brain atlases are likely to be at the core of this defence.”

Source:  University of Edinburgh

Although past research has associated obesity with increased risk of dementia, a new study – deemed the largest ever to assess the link between body mass index and dementia risk – suggests obesity could actually be a protective factor against the condition, while people who are underweight may be at increased risk.

A large retrospective cohort study, published in The Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology, has revealed a surprising association between being underweight in mid-life and late-life, and increased risk of dementia.

The study assessed the medical records of almost 2 million people in the UK in order to gain a better understanding of how obesity affects dementia risk. The researchers found that, compared with adults who had a healthy BMI (between 20-25 kg/m2), those who were underweight – defined in this study as a BMI less than 20 kg/m2 – during middle age were 34% more likely to be diagnosed with dementia. This increased risk remained for 15 years after adults’ underweight status was recorded.

The team notes that participants with a BMI of less than 18.5 kg/m2 are usually classed as underweight, but the threshold was raised in this study to allow comparisons with past studies, which have defined a BMI of less than 20 kg/m2 as underweight.

The researchers also found that middle-aged adults’ risk of dementia steadily reduced as their BMI increased. Compared with adults who had a healthy BMI, those who were severely obese (BMI greater than 40 kg/m2) were 29% less likely to develop dementia. The team says their results remained even after accounting for factors associated with increased dementia risk, including smoking and alcohol consumption. In addition, the results were not affected by adults’ age at dementia diagnosis or the decade in which they were born, according to the researchers.

Source: Medical News Today

Nutritional shortcomings are a key driver of age-related decline and disability whereas proper diet can increase years of healthy life. In support of the European Innovation Partnership on Active and Healthy Ageing, Joint Research Centre (JRC) scientists have reviewed the evidence on the role key nutrients and diet plays in promoting healthy ageing.

JRC scientists collected evidence on the prevention and treatment of age-related diseases with a focus on under-nutrition in older people, a main cause as well as a consequence of functional decline. The resulting report “The role of Nutrition in Active and Healthy Ageing” provides an important contribution to the overall target of the Partnership which is to increase the average healthy lifespan by two years by 2020, to enable EU citizens to lead healthy, active and independent lives while ageing and to improve the sustainability and efficiency of social and health care.