Active Minds Linked To Dementia – Games, brain training exercises, crossword puzzles, sudoku and listening to the radio are known to keep the brain active and help to stave off the effects of Alzheimer’s Disease and dementia. How they those activities do this is by keeping thoughts active, not allowing the mind to slow down and also by using the person’s memory, which helps put off memory loss.
However, the down side is that when an older person with an active mind get dementia, the onset happen a lot quicker, meaning that while mental problems and deficiencies are held back, they make up for loss time by happening at a much faster rate.
Dr Robert Wilson, of Rush University Medical Centre in Chicago, had this to say about the study:
“We think that mental activity tends to stave of the initial symptoms of cognitive impairment and therefore to delay dementia onset,” he said.
“However, if dementia does eventually develop, it progresses more rapidly in those who had previously maintained a mentally active lifestyle.”
The reasons for this, he does not know for sure. Perhaps the human brain as an expiry date that cannot be changed?