A new study reveals that vascular health, inflammation, and blood glucose levels play a role in brain aging. Researchers found that factors affecting blood vessels can also impact brain age, highlighting the importance of maintaining healthy blood vessels for brain protection.
We celebrate getting older on the same day each year, but parts of our bodies can actually age at different speeds. A new study points to some of the lifestyle choices that influence the rate of brain aging. Led by researchers from the Karolinska Institute and the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, an international team looked at various biological signals to estimate brain age in 70-year-olds with no cognitive impairment.
What stood out from their analysis of 739 people was the importance of vascular (blood vessel) health when it comes to keeping brains looking young. 'A take-home from the study is that factors that adversely affect the blood vessels can also be related to older-looking brains, which shows how important it is to keep your blood vessels healthy to protect your brain,' as well as higher levels of inflammation and higher levels of blood glucose – indicating a mix of interconnected factors having an impact. There were some variations between men and women – with glucose levels making more of a difference to brain age in men, for example – which is something the researchers are keen to follow up on in the future. Information from blood samples was then cross-referenced with the assessed brain ages, together with data collected by the researchers on various lifestyle factors, medical conditions, and cognitive tests. 'It's a research tool that still needs further evaluation, but our aim is for it also to be of clinical use in the future, such as in dementia investigations.'– and many of them we can do something about, either on an individual or societal level. Ultimately, researchers are looking for ways we can stop dementia from developing in the first plac
BRAIN AGING VASCULAR HEALTH INFLAMMATION BLOOD GLUCOSE LIFESTYLE CHOICES
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