Articles related to COGNITIVE HEALTH/MEMORY

Among 150 people ages 65 to 88, investigational transcranial alternating current stimulation for 20 minutes over 4 consecutive days produced selective improvements in working and long-term memory in older adults that lasted for at least a month The rate of memory improvement over 4 days predicted the size of memory benefits 1 month later, the researchers found. Moreover, people with lower baseline cognitive function experienced larger and longer lasting memory improvements. “We found that by applying extremely weak electrical current safely and noninvasively to the prefrontal cortex at a high frequency, we could selectively improve long-term memory in older people aged 65 to 88 years old without changing short-term memory.” Robert Reinhart, PhD, Boston University in Nature Neuroscience

According to Paul Harrison, FRCPsych, of the University of Oxford in England, and colleagues, health records of nearly 1.3 million people, mostly in the US, revealed that risks of cognitive deficit (brain fog), dementia, psychotic disorders, and epilepsy or seizures were elevated at 2 years for adults who had COVID. Adult COVID patients had an increased risk of anxiety and depression in the first six months, but this risk decreased over time, the researchers reported in Lancet Psychiatry.

This study enrolled individuals with AD who had been on a stable dose of donezepil forat least 90 days. They were then treated for 12 weeks with the addition of themodulator of cholinergic neurotransmission AD101, or placebo. Those receiving AD101had mean improvement of approximately 2 points on the Alzheimer DiseaseAssessment Scale-Cognitive (ADAS-Cog) Subscale. Individuals who had continued donezepil plusplacebo showed declines on ADAS-Cog.

The findings supported the National Institute on Aging-Alzheimer’s Association (NIA-AA) research framework for Alzheimer’s disease, which is based on biomarkers of amyloid, tau, and neurodegeneration.

The update, which was presented during a panel discussion at the Alzheimer Association International Conference 2022 (AAIC2022) in San Diego, CA, is based on evidence from real-world use of aducanumab and is intended to improve risk mitigation, safety monitoring, patient selection, and shared decision-making.

Higher levels of physical activity were associated with greater processing speed reserve in older women but not in older men, according to a recent study. This is good news, as dementia may be slowed by cognitive reserve, the capacity to maintain cognition in the face of brain damage. A cognitively active lifestyle that includes reading and information processing may delay the onset of dementia in Alzheimer’s disease by up to 5 years in persons in their 80s, according to recent research. Other research has suggested that cognitive reserve may be one factor in some centenarians’ ability to resist cognitive decline in the face of brain dysfunction.