Brain Health

Dr. Daniel Amen has dedicated his life to educating people about brain health. Alzheimer’s has been steadily on the rise and there is no apparent cure on the horizon. After conducting over 70,000 brain scans on a wide variety of people, he has discovered that the best way to prevent brain disease is to decreases illnesses such as obesity, heart disease, diabetes, depression and sleep apnea. Here are a few specific items he uses to guide his patients and students:

Here are 10 specific things that increase the likelihood of brain disease:

1. Brain injury
2. Drugs & alcohol
3. Obesity/diabetes
4. Sleep Apnea
5. Smoking/Caffeine
6. Toxins
7. Poor diet
8. Stress/depression
9. Lack of exercise
10. Bad decisions and unhealthy peer groups

Here are 10 specific things that lead to brain health:

1. Protecting the brain from injury
2. Conscientiousness (doing what you say you are going to do)
3. Healthy weight
4. 8 hours of sleep
5. New learning
6. Great diet (natural, organic and unprocessed foods)
7. Omega 3’s and green tea
8. Exercise
9. Gratitude
10. Stress management

There would be no way to incorporate all of these at once, so I challenge you to pick one or two to focus on. My personal pick to focus on will be centered around consistently getting 7-8 hours of sleep and slowly replacing coffee with green tea. Of all the things that we invest in, I can’t think of a better investment than our brain.