As Education Increases, Dementia Declines
Experts urge keeping the brain active to stave off Alzheimer's

(HealthDay News) -- A person's intellectual activity and education level might alter the impact of Alzheimer's disease.

Having a greater cognitive reserve seems to reduce dementia symptoms, even in people who already have significant Alzheimer's-related amyloid plaques in the brain, according to Catherine M. Roe, a research instructor in neurology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

Cognitive reserve is the concept that "the way that some people process information, the brain networks they use, allows them to cope better," Roe told HealthDay.

She authored a study that used positron emission tomography, called PET scans, to analyze the brains of 37 people with Alzheimer's-type dementia and 161 people who were dementia-free. All the participants took tests to measure their thinking ability and were injected with a radio-carbon-labeled compound that attaches to amyloid plaques in the brain.

"We divided the individuals into two groups, those with high uptake of the compound, indicating more plaques in the brain, and those with low uptake, indicating few or no plaques," Roe said. "For people with low uptake, there was no relation to education in their cognitive scores. For high uptake, meaning significant plaques in the brain, we found an association with education," she noted.

"The more education they had, the fewer the symptoms of dementia," Roe explained. The findings were published in the journal Archives of Neurology.

One of the originator's of the cognitive reserve theory says it's difficult to say exactly what people can do to boost their cognitive reserve.

"We really don't know the recipe of what activity and how much would work," Yaakov Stern, a professor of clinical neuropsychology at the Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer's Disease at Columbia University, told HealthDay. "We really need controlled studies."

But, as a general rule, it "doesn't hurt to remain active, physically as well as mentally," Stern said. "It's just that there are no studies to show that these activities really make a difference."

Currently, there is no cure for Alzheimer's disease, but researchers are trying to find ways to delay the onset of the disease, slow its progress or prevent it altogether, according to the U.S. National Institute on Aging. Being able to delay the onset of dementia symptoms by five years could significantly lower the number of people with Alzheimer's.

On the Web

To learn more about Alzheimer's disease, visit the U.S. National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.

SOURCES: HealthDay News ; Catherine M. Roe, Ph.D., research instructor in neurology, Washington University, St. Louis; Yaakov Stern, Ph.D., professor, clinical neuropsychology, Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer's Disease, Columbia University, New York City; November 2008, Archives of Neurology; U.S. National Institute on Aging (www.nia.nih.gov)
Author: Robert Preidt
Publication Date: Nov. 30, 2009
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