Nutrition and Brain Health

Better Brain Blog: Nutrition and Brain Health

It’s important to talk about Nutrition when we talk about Brain Health, because diet can be a modifiable risk factor for prevention of dementia.

Most of the data so far on nutrition and dementia prevention is complicated by a few factors. First, most of the current data we have relies on a subject’s memory of what they have eaten, and this data can be pretty flawed for obvious reasons. Second, people in both higher socioeconomic and higher educational groups tend to eat “brain-healthier” foods than those in the lower groups. This also likely skews the data a bit. 

To date, omega-3 fatty acids (via fish consumption or dietary supplementation), a Mediterranean style diet, and the MIND diet are among the most studied. The MIND diet (Mediterranean-DASH Diet Intervention for Neurodegenerative Delay) emphasizes natural, plant-based foods, limits foods that are high in animal and saturated fats, and specifies green leafy vegetables and berries. The MIND diet is currently being studied as a possible way to lower dementia risk over time. So far, the data shows that even only moderate adherence to the MIND diet can reduce one’s risk of dementia significantly. This MIND diet has already been shown to reduce the risk of developing Parkinson disease and slow the progression of the disease in those who have it.

We all know that what we eat can make us feel good or make us feel bad in our bodies. But what about our brains?

The brain cannot store its own energy and can only use two energy sources for processing. These include Glucose (sugar) and Ketones, which are made in the liver from fatty acids. The brain uses glucose when energy is needed and will revert to using ketones when the liver and blood are out of glucose. Examples of the latter including starvation, fasting or the ketogenic diet. The higher the glycemic index of the food, the faster the sugar enters the bloodstream and the more sugar enters the bloodstream. 

 In particular, the following foods are particular detrimental to brain function:

1)    Sweets that contain sugar. The problem with sugar is that sugar that is not immediately used by the body as an energy source is stored as fat. 

2)    Sugary drinks and Soda

3)    Refined carbohydrates

4)    Trans-saturated fats such as packaged baked goods and fried foods. These kinds of fats increase your bad cholesterol, also known as your LDL, and lower your good cholesterol, also known as HDL. These trans-saturated fats are highly inflammatory and raise your risk of stroke, heart disease, and diabetes, as well. 

5)    Processed foods

Good rules of thumb for choosing brain-healthy foods include the following:

1)    First, eat fresh foods. Over 75% of processed foods contain sugar, so it’s wise to avoid processed foods, in general. Eat fresh foods instead. 

2)    Eat a Rainbow. Be sure to eat a variety of plants! Plants contain healing and beneficial antioxidants and phytonutrientsbased on their colors. Try to eat two foods from each colored plant group each day.

3)    Eat good or “healthy” fats such as plant oils harvested without heat, such as olive oil, grapeseed oil, walnut oil, sesame oil. Other healthy fats include fish, nuts, seeds, olives, and avocados. Cholesterol from healthy fats such as these, high in Omega 3,help heal the heart and brain, enhancing cognitive functions. 

4)    It’s important to adopt a mindset of improvement and learning each day rather than feeling like a failure if you don’t have 100% perfection with your diet. 

So what exactly is the MIND Diet and how can you get started?

The MIND diet is a combination of the Mediterranean and DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) eating patterns.

• Traditional Mediterranean diets consist primarily of whole, minimally processed foods including grains, legumes, vegetables, fruit, nuts and fish. Small amounts of meat, eggs and dairy products, and a modest amount of alcohol, may also be included.

• The DASH diet emphasizes fruit, vegetables and low-fat dairy products. It includes whole grains, poultry, fish and nuts but is limited in fat (specifically saturated fat), red meat, sodium, added sugars, and sugar-sweetened beverages.

The MIND diet encourages many of the plant-based foods recommended in the Mediterranean and DASH diets, as well as fish and poultry. It also shares the recommendation to limit saturated fats and added sugars. The factors that differentiate the MIND diet come from the focus on daily and weekly recommendations for specific foods and food groups.

While there is a strong emphasis on which foods to consume with the MIND diet, it also strongly encourages limitations on several categories of food, including: red meats, saturated fats such as butter and margarine, cheese, refined grains, added sugars and fried foods.

Study results spanning an average of four and a half years showed that participants following the MIND diet lowered their risk of AD by as much as 53 percent in participants who adhered to the diet rigorously, and by about 35 percent in those who followed it moderately well. More research is ongoing to confirm these results, however, using this dietary pattern approach seems to be a promising strategy to improve cognitive decline in the older population.