H E A LT H & W E L L N E S S
An Ounce of Prevention Alzheimer’s disease begins 20 years before symptoms appear BY CHRISTINA ACEVEDO Red Seal Chef, Nutritionist and Author of Two Little F Words based in Vancouver Island and Mexico. HONEYANDVANILLA
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o you know what increases your risk of getting Alzheimer’s disease? Your first thought, like most, is probably genetics. But really, our genes play a much smaller role than we think. Research shows that epigenetics is the biggest factor when determining your risk for Alzheimer’s, not your genes. Epigenetics means “above our genes” and is the study of how your behaviours and environment can cause changes that affect the way your genes work. This is encouraging news because it means that we have more power over our health than we think. This is not to disregard the fact that if you have one or two alleles of the ApoE4 gene, that it does not increase your risk of getting Alzheimer’s disease, it does but the powerful little gem I am offering to you is that your everyday lifestyle choices are much more powerful than you think when it comes to decreasing your chances of developing Alzheimer’s disease.
92 I Inspiration Issue I IMPACT MAGAZINE
If this disease starts twenty years before symptoms occur, wouldn’t you agree that learning about the root causes and what you can do right now should be a priority? According to Dr. Dale Bredesen, a leading Functional Medicine Doctor in Alzheimer’s disease, there are many reasons why someone develops Alzheimer’s disease and it is not the same reason for everyone. Following one of the laws of functional medicine, there is probably more than one imbalance in the body that is causing a person's unique symptoms. Dr. Bredesen explains the risks/subtypes in his book, The End of Alzheimer’s, as follows: • Inflammatory This can be due to how our body reacts to certain foods, stress or environmental sensitivities as well as ApoE 4 gene status. • Glycotoxic This is due to high insulin and blood sugar imbalance, type 2 diabetes.
• Atrophic Cells and systems degenerating due to lack of trophic factors such as BDNF or hormones such as lack of estrogen in menopausal years. • Toxic Can be due to exposure to mycotoxins from mold, stealth infections such as lyme, heavy metal burden, environmental toxins. • Vascular Due to reduction in blood getting to the brain from “leakiness” in vascular tissue. • Traumatic Due to traumatic brain injury/concussion. Your brain swells and causes inflammation to protect itself when it gets injured, this can cause long term damage. All of these above subtypes have one thing in common, their root lies in inflammation, specifically in the brain. So what can you do with this information, how do you reduce your risk now that you know what increases your risk?