[Week 12] Brain fitness club

Recently, a big breakthrough in research on Alzheimer's disease has occurred. Scientists promise that we will soon be able to prevent the disease. The agile American nation , instead of waiting for these promises come to fruition , has taken matters into their own hands and started to work out hard in neurofitness clubs.

In the U.S. , near thousands of fitness clubs, the" brain fitness clubs" started to appear. Nobody expected such popularity – a total madness on their point begun. Their creator and trainer, Michael Gonzalez- Wallace claims that these systems "in addition to strengthen of your muscles can also train your brain cells ."

Wealthier Americans do not limit themselves to visiting neurofitness clubs regularly but they are also willing to pay even a few thousand dollars for solving puzzles or rebuses with a private " mental consultant ." And if someone haven't the time or money , they choose one of hundreds applications for phones and tablets. The most popular is the Luminosity .

Gary Small is a professor of neuropsychiatry and author of many books about memory. The last one - " The Alzheimer 's Prevention Program : Keep Your Brain Healthy for the Rest of Your Life " - is on the bestseller's list created by "New York Times " . While other doctors , make fun of the Small's Hollywood lifestyle, patients line up in a long queue to see him.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DV68_tM_Sgo

In response to these demands and thousands of questions about protecting from dementia , the doctors specialized in brain created so called " Memory Boot Camps". These are a several hours long activities where you can get to know neurofit exercises , learn the remembering techniques and stay up to date with innovations on the prevention of Alzheimer's.

Maybe the interest in disease , about which we would prefer to forget , is followed by U.S's fashion for DNA testing . These results of a long list of genes that may predispose us to various diseases. We can get for example an information whether we have the APOE gene, which occurs in some patients with Alzheimer's disease and may cause the disease even for 30-40 -year-olds . Such tests are available only on request.“ Silver Alert " is an action which shows people the importance of acquisition of such knowledge.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1XDro7o-H8

We should reacts before we see the negative consequences- Paul Ainsen says. When the patient complain about disorientation, has problems with concentration and forgetting the closest people names- it is probably too late to stop his or her brain damage.

American Research Institute for Aging shows that the diet consisting of vegetables and fruits is essential. A healthy diet can reduce the risk of dementia by as much as 50 percent . Experiments on rats fed with modern diet consisting of fats and simple carbohydrates have shown that rodents after three months of such diet fell out much worse on memory tests .

The second piece of that puzzle is an activity . Proof ? This is the classic research made few years ago. When you ask young people about the solution to a simple task , and peeping at their brains, using magnetic resonance, scans shows activity in several brain areas . For older people who do not lead very active lifestyles , the same job involves more areas . Probably the brain cannot cope , it is a bit confused and has to operate more resources. But for older people who regularly exercise , the scans looks very much like in young people . How is this possible ? The rodents show the answer again . Physical exercise increases the number of blood vessels supplying blood to the brain, affect the number of connections between neurons and increase the level of nerve growth factor . All this means that neurons can easily regenerate .

For this we need to add the brain cells work .

So , to protect your brain , you have to train it when you're a young person. For those who did not, remains neurofitness . But does it work? Many scientists look skeptically at neurofitness clubs , treating them as another marketing product for terrified customers . In the end, we know crosswords and sudoku for years. Maybe they are worth a trying?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpm4GbO4V18

1. In your opinion, how much marketing and how much scientific is in neurofitness clubs?
2. Do you agree with the statement that people who exercise the mind longer persist in their health?
3. Do you think that neurofitness fashion will appear in Poland?