Comprehensive lifestyle changes impact wellbeing in those with early Alzheimer’s disease, Elizabeth Tracey reports

Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:00 — 1.4MB)

Subscribe: RSS

Lifestyle interventions are more effective than medications in early Alzheimer’s disease, a study led by Majid Fotuhi, a neurologist at Johns Hopkins, has found. When a number of trials were analyzed together, implementation of several lifestyle changes emerged as superior as well as avoiding negative side effects of medication use.

Fotuhi: When people do their lifestyle interventions they do notice an improvement in the current functions and it's not just that the cognitive function is better. Many of the studies that have looked at other outcome measures such as mood or sleep or sense of well-being report positive outcomes, so people have better quality of life. If you go and exercise let's say exercise 45 minutes five times a week and you cut back on your smoking and you treat your sleep apnea 3 months later you feel better. Your risks are lower, you feel the difference. This is exactly what happens with medications and lifestyle functions with regards to aging and Alzheimer disease.     :32

Fotuhi says until more effective medications for Alzheimer’s disease are developed there is no compelling case to use them. At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.