5 Foods That Help Prevent Alzheimer’s Disease | Dr. Neal Barnard Live Q&A

more than 6 million Americans have Alzheimer's disease and that is a number that is expected to more than double over the next quarter Century so our goal today is to put the power of prevention in your hands and teach you how to keep a sharp mind as you get older and why that could begin with the food that is on your plate welcome to the exam room live brought to you by the Physicians committee hello I am the weight loss Champion Chuck Carroll We Appreciate You raising your health IQ with us in more than 150 countries around the world and making the exam room one of the most consumed nutrition podcasts anywhere on the planet today so today we do have five Powerhouse brain boosting foods that we're going to be talking about five foods that can help lower your risk of Alzheimer's disease and hopefully prevent cognitive decline into your golden years and sharing those five foods with us and a lot more is renowned doctor and nutrition expert also a gentleman whose family has been personally touched like so many others by Alzheimer's disease Dr Neil Barnard is here with us today and we're also going to take a step Beyond food we're going to be talking about the latest Alzheimer's drugs to hit the market looking at alcohol and Alzheimer's disease supplements olive oil and Alzheimer's disease and whether we may ever get to a point where we can say yeah we can reverse this thing or possibly even cure it I don't know what the future holds but we're going to get Dr Barnard's opinion and if there's a question that you have for Dr Barnard go ahead drop it in the comments or in the chat we're going to get to as many as we can when we open up the doctor's mailbag in just a little bit but let's get going right now and welcome Dr Barnard to the exam room live appreciate you making the time this week again my friend great to see you Chuck before we get those five foods let me ask you generally speaking how strong is the connection between diet and Alzheimer's disease compared to genetics and Alzheimer's well you know uh a decade or two decades ago we really thought it was all jeans and old age if you have the jeans and then as you would reach older age they would start to to affect you and that was really pretty much it but the the Turning Point really came when certain studies that had been in progress for quite some time tracking certain variables in life what you eat how much you exercise and other things as it started to become clear that in exactly the same way as heart disease could have been predicted by a high cholesterol level by smoking by high blood pressure the same seems to be true with Alzheimer's disease so what's the exact proportion of the role of genes versus the role of Lifestyle factors we don't exactly have a proportion but it does look like probably the majority of cases of Alzheimer's disease could either be prevented or substantially delayed by factors that we can control all right let's talk about those factors beginning with food and so let's get those top five what are your Top Foods Dr Barnard for preventing Alzheimer's disease okay top of the list is a food that everybody knows about but people tend to neglect and that is the berry group blueberries strawberries raspberries when researchers have looked at people who consume the most berries what they discover is they're getting something called anthocyanins that's uh the pigment that makes blueberries blue or makes grapes sort of a dark red color anthocyanins are also the the coloring in the autumn leaves so it's sort of Nature's painting box what what matters about them is that they are antioxidants and they knock out free radicals free radicals are probably the damaging part of what's hitting the brain researchers have found that they are not only good uh probably for for reducing the risk of Alzheimer's but let's say a person is in the first stages they have a condition we call Mild cognitive impairment you're still yourself but you can't you're having trouble balancing your checkbook more than usual your names are dropping out words are dropping out like you're trying to think of the name of an actor in a film that you just saw you can't think of it uh that happens to everybody from time to time but if it's happening all day long every single day and the names and the words are dropping out that's mild cognitive impairment researchers at the University of Cincinnati showed that if blueberry juice or even grape juice that you get at the grocery store uh will to an extent reverse the mild cognitive impairment and this was seen in three months in people who would consume a cup in the morning and a cup at night or about two cups of their respective juice so stay tuned for that that's very that's number one number two green leafy vegetables and whether you're talking about spinach or kale or collards or or even lettuce that you might put in a salad green leafy vegetables do seem to be associated in epidemiologic studies with less risk of developing Alzheimer's and the cool thing about it is most people don't get much of Annie so that a person who has even one or two servings a day has a measurable benefit compared to the people who aren't getting any so more vegetables less Alzheimer's disease number three vitamin E not in pills vitamin E in its natural source if you look at a sesame seed inside that little seed or a sunflower seed or an almond there are traces of vitamin E and the more people get vitamin E the more their risk of of developing Alzheimer's drops and in the Chicago health and aging study they found that those people getting more vitamin E tended to cut their Risk by about 50 percent completely apart from anything else they would do with their diet so because seeds and nuts are fatty I suggest going for about one small handful a day that's about one ounce pour them into your hand by the time it hits your fingers that's that's more than an ounce so just that little bit will do us uh number four vitamin B12 and here don't denglect your vitamin B12 people who are deficient in this vitamin are at higher risk of dementia overall and it's the easiest thing in the Dew the easiest thing to do to go to the store pick up a supplement the amount your body needs is 2.4 micrograms all the supplements have more so get one that's 100 or 200 micrograms fine that'll take care of you and my fifth one is actually not a food but exercise researchers at the University of Illinois showed that when people lace up their sneakers and do a brisk walk 40 minutes three times a week they're not not only does it seem to reduce the likelihood of getting dementia later it also re reverses some of those earlier signs uh memory tests go better but the hippocampus which is at the center of the brain intends to um to shrink over time and it because it's the center of memory that's not good you can show that it actually that shrinkage is actually reversed when people exercise and it doesn't have to be a marathon 40 minute brisk Buck three times a week those are my five yeah I I'd love that uh sticking with exercise here for a minute I love the fact that uh it doesn't have to be the marathon I think that's the key exercise can be so intimidating to the person who's been sedentary for a long time so just knowing that a walk will do a lot of good I think is really kind of comforting and reassuring um just for the purposes of really getting specific and Clarity here uh when you say a brisk walk is are we talking about walking to the point where you can basically still carry on a conversation but you're not panting what is a brisk walking in your definition there you want it to be um fast enough so that you can feel your pulse elevating a little bit you don't have to take your pulse but you can stop and take it so you do need to have your heart beating a little bit faster but not you're not working so hard that you can't speak um and you're really just huffing and puffing that's a brisk walk now if you're up for doing more great do more that's fine now the way the University of Illinois researchers started this was interesting they took sedentary people and they said do a 10 minute walk three days a week uh then the following week 15 and then the following week 20 minutes the following week 25 you just add five minutes a week so it's something just about anybody can do and once you've got up to a 40-minute brisk walk three times a week that was the level that reversed brain trinket all right there's a couple other things I want to ask you about number one is iodine I've heard uh some people speculate that that also plays a role in cognitive function and uh we it is not uncommon whatsoever on the show for us to get questions about iodine sources on a plant-based diet what do we know about that connection um it's an important connection the uh the role of iodine is making thyroid hormone your thyroid at the base of your neck needs that iodine to make that hormone if you don't have it everything shuts down including brain function you'll find that your mood is really going south and that your cognition is not what it should be and this is important because iodine is not in a lot of foods naturally it's added to Salt so you have iodized salt and a lot of people nowadays are having Himalayan salt or kosher salt or sea salt that may not be iodized so read the label if it's iodized good if you're unsure add see vegetables to your diet the Nori wrap on your cucumber roll or the wakame or the RMA these are common seaweeds that you'll get in any Japanese restaurant or health food store if you find a way to bring them into your routine they are a really rich source of iodine too there are also supplements that you can buy at the store but that's really the role of it and I know that the thought of adding salt to food can be a little bit confusing for some people how much is too much should we be doing it at all so you just mentioned iodized salt are we talking just a little pinch a little shake at the table how much are we talking here well keep in mind you do need some sodium in your diet it should not be avoided completely there there is a requirement that your body has for some sodium it's an important electrolyte where people run into trouble is when they overdo it as most Americans do but if you have even about a third of a teaspoon of iodized salt you're going to get a substantial amount of iodine so you get that in the course of the day you're going to be fine but don't neglect our friends to see vegetables they are kind of Nature's really best source oh yeah I was I was enjoying some uh New York uh Sushi while I was up there the vegetable rolls are out of this world at some of those shops in New York man I'm telling you so tasty um I also want to ask you before we open up the doctor's mailbag about mushrooms um our colleagues and I have talked about them in the past in particular in terms of brain health as well uh what can you tell us about mushrooms and cognitive function and possibly even a connection with Alzheimer's yeah mushrooms are sort of the big uninvestigated food up until recently people just thought of them as something that grew in the shady area beside your house but they have emerged in a couple of different ways what got people's attention first was breast cancer uh women consuming the most mushrooms have quite a substantial reduction in breast cancer risk but also there has been a question as to whether or not mushrooms might be a natural source of vitamin D who knew uh we think of vitamin D as hitting our skin creating the vitamin D there but then there's the thought that it may do the same for um that sunlight on the mushrooms May create it and then you have the mushrooms on your salad and so you're getting the vitamin D in that Source um that in turn then can support brain function I do have a caveat though when it comes to mushrooms cook them they should be cooked if you if they are raw and some of them there are Believe It or Not natural traces of formaldehyde that will form in the mushrooms cooking knocks that out well that doesn't sound very appealing or appetizing formaldehyde how you like a little formaldehyde with your dinner tonight no thank you right exactly it doesn't mean you can never have a raw mushroom but for the most part if you're eating them substantially it's better to cook them all right let's go ahead and open up the doctor's mail bag I want to grab a question uh we have someone wondering about the association between alcohol and Alzheimer's risk and that brings us to Wine this is a question from Mary who says that the Mind diet which is recommended for Alzheimer's prevention does promote drinking red wine you also mentioned that grape juice can have potentially beneficial effects earlier in the show so what do we know about red wine in particular into a broader extent also what's the alcohol Alzheimer's connection yeah uh this has been something that's been really controversial um alcohol in modest consumption does in observational studies it does seem to reduce the likelihood of developing Alzheimer's disease once use is more than moderate a couple of drinks a day then you start to see everything gets worse um the more alcohol people drink the more brain problems they have and it's a contributor to dementia so then that raises the question well what is it about that little bit of alcohol that might be helpful what we suspect is that it's not the alcohol in the wine but all of those wonderful pigments there are compounds like Resveratrol and others and there are the anthocyanins that I mentioned earlier that are not only in the wine but they're in the juice so um alcohol itself is probably not beneficial to the brain but the things that go along with it probably are and haven't there been studies recently that show kind of an issue of warning that really there is not much of an upside whatsoever in terms of health and alcohol consumption yes uh where we see the the greatest concerns are with cancer risk because the list of cancers that are more common when people drink alcohol it's getting longer all the time and what really got everybody's attention was with breast cancer even having one drink a day for a woman who relaxes at the end of the day with a glass of wine her risk of breast cancer is higher than her friend who doesn't drink alcohol at all so it's kind of made a lot of us have to take off our party hats a bit yeah and by the way I'm really looking forward to Dr Christy funk's presentation on breast cancer at the International Conference on nutrition and medicine she always does such an amazing job with that so I I just I'm just salivating waiting for for the latest from her um Let's do an exam room we'll talk more about icnem in just a little bit as well Dr Bronner but let's do an exam roomie roll call real quick we've got that Global Health turnout again today Karen is watching in Germany Kevin is in Burbank California having breakfast with us Jen is in Edmonton Alberta bad in Tulsa and Annette in Nova Scotia Canada hello everybody wherever it is that you are we appreciate you raising your health IQs with us um so cool I love the the global impact the studies or or the statistics that I shared earlier in the show are about the us but clearly Dr Barnard Alzheimer's is a disease that does not know any sort of global boundary whatsoever it really does impact every country around the world yes it does and yet at the same time I have to think that as the world changes as our our diets change things can sometimes change for the worse or for the better and we've seen this really you look in Japan and at the very southern end of Japan look at Okinawa in Okinawa you have more centenarians than anywhere else I mean people who live to be a hundred it's Blue Zone and as McDonald's and so forth has moved into Okinawa and the traditional diet which amazingly enough is based on sweet potatoes as you know if it gets sort of hamburgerized you see longevity being threatened and also uh brain health being threatened as well so it's a worldwide problem but I think that when people are eating in the most helpful way the way that perhaps many cultures used to and have given up a little bit if they eat in a healthful way they have a measure of protection all right uh we were talking about sea vegetables a little bit earlier Harvey is wondering about fish though and whether eating fish can cause Alzheimer's he says he's a little bit confused uh because he knows that Omega-3s definitely are good for brain health and um when I got this question Dr Barnett he sent this in ahead of time I was kind of doing a little bit of research in advance and I came across an article that was on Harvard Medical school's website and it says fish was the single most important dietary factor in lowering the risk of cognitive impairment vegetables were second best and all other Foods showed smaller insignificant effects I found that a little bit interesting in your research and the studies that you've seen what have you discovered as far as a connection between the two uh the research is really to be continued but the bottom line what people are thinking about with fish is that fish has long chain uh Omega-3s that's EPA and DHA that's those are good here you know they're they're used in in brain chemistry and so that's important but keep in mind fish is a cocktail if you took fish fat fish oil sent it to a laboratory they'd say yeah there is some DHA and some EPA in there but there's also some saturated fat which has the opposite effect and it has some cholesterol in it too plus fish is one of the dirtiest Foods if you will because let's face it fishing live in what is increasingly becoming the human sewer thing about the waterways and the oceans and the little fish that is eaten by the bigger fish transmits Mercury and other heavy metals up the food chain so fish is kind of a cocktail so if you say well what's how can I take advantage of this in the best way take the good and get away from the bad you can get DHA and EPA if you wish to as a supplement and the old way of doing that was to get fish oil supplements but as of oh maybe six or eight years ago there have been vegan supplements made of DHA and EPA pure from entirely Botanical sources it's exactly the same thing but there's no fish in there there's no fishy smell there's no heavy metals no saturated fat nothing um but let me let me give a couple of questions about this though um the argument for them is that research studies have suggested that people who are low in EPA and DHA may have higher risk of Alzheimer's but the argument against them is that people who supplement men who supplement for some reason that we've never figured out have a higher risk of prostate cancer the concern is that getting too much of these oils can increase cancer risk so stay tuned the last bit of advice I have is if you're going to supplement you can do one thing first you can see if you are deficient there are companies like Omega Quant that will send you a little card put a drop of blood on it mail it in they'll tell you what your EPA and DHA levels are if you're low you can supplement if you're high you don't so right now most people aren't necessarily recommending supplementation but those are the issues that they're thinking about uh you mentioned heavy metals there that brings us to a question from Kaden who was wondering whether an iron supplement might be safe for Alzheimer's disease she says that she's taking it right now under advice of her doctor okay um Iron is a driver of Alzheimer's disease um overall for people in general iron as you know rusts the fact that it rusts is a sign of oxidation that triggers the production of free radicals in your body that can damage your brain so we've known for quite some time that people have too much iron too much copper too much aluminum in their in their diets are at higher risk of dementias of various kinds including Alzheimer's so what do you do if you are low in iron well the first thing your doctor is going to try to do is figure out are you really low in iron your doctor will do tests like ferritin total iron binding capacity your doctor could see if you're really low in iron if you are the next question is why uh are you a young woman with extra menstrual flow are you bleeding from your digestive tract are you losing blood somewhere that's got to be job one to figure that out and if you're just low for whatever reason and you've ruled out these other things first place to supplement is green leafy vegetables loaded with iron in a healthy form and then failing that there are supplements that can be used and if you are making up for a deficit that's not dangerous if you are pushing them just because you're feeling a little tired and you're now overdosing on iron that's where you're going to run into trouble you know I was reading an article that was published in the Washington Post over the weekend and they were just touting um the greatness that is the cast iron skillet the old traditional cast iron skillet that it seems many many many kitchens around the country and around the world have um what is your take on cookware is a cast iron skillet still a good idea even though it may be one that's been passed down through the generations it's a good idea to take a hammer and nail and pound it into your wall and hang that cast iron skillet on there and admire how it looks if it is your go-to pan that you're frying in every day you're going to get iron in your food that you do not need and it's going to increase your iron level that's a bad thing the non-stick cookware is really good now um it's not the kind of Teflon that back in the 1970s would chip off into your food um the new uh pans like a made-in pan for example that has that really good non-stick surface they work you don't have to use oil with them and and I would suggest using that in your cooking and leave the cast iron out if your cast iron pan is something you're using once a month no problem who cares but if it's your go-to pan you're getting too much iron um let's take a question from Rich well Rich at 1207 says he gets a three pound bag of organic blueberries from Costco at a great price uh those are frozen I'm familiar I've got two bags in my freezer downstairs as well um is eating a frozen blueberry going to give someone the same benefit as eating a fresh blueberry in terms of cognitive performance identical yep exactly and they're they're very convenient you know blueberries you got to hand it to the blueberry Growers I don't know how they managed to get them out on the truck and have them just at that right amount of ripeness because they don't last very long it's a very short window if you buy them Frozen your window is now like a couple of months that you can use them so that's fine the one thing I would do recommend with berries they're a fragile plant um so that means that farmers often are kind of keen on pesticides to try to protect them from insects if you can get them organic so much the better all right Shelby's curious about what you may think of the latest Alzheimer's drugs that have been uh just uh I guess given the green light um saw a lot of headlines about this in the last few weeks what what do we know about them yeah it's very exciting um the the drug is called Le Camby and what researchers have done is they have tracked memory and people diagnosed with Alzheimer's you track their memory judgment problem solving and over time these things will tend to decline with like candy they they do decline more gradually uh that's the good news the asterisk on it is nobody thinks it's a cure nobody feels that the brain deterioration is going to stop and that the the the the root of decline it's not a dramatic change but it does slow it for many patients so um it's a a good area to be continuing to look at kind of along that same front Bobby is wondering about how a person might consider modifying their diet after they have been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease what can be done to at least slow cognitive decline at that point well if we're in the really early stages the states that we call Mild cognitive impairment that's where further research has really shown promise I mentioned the exercise portion these were people who had mild cognitive impairment and they laced up their sneakers 40 minute brisk walk three times a week and you can show not just that you perform better on paper and pencil tests but the hippocampus actually seems to be restored the shrinkage of that organ that's the seat of memory actually reverses and this will happen over about a year's time very very exciting I also mentioned the anthocyanin rich foods berries This research has been done with blueberries and with grapes and this is the amount of about one cup twice a day of ordinary juices work fine those are the areas that really have been shown but once the disease has passed beyond the stage of mild cognitive impairment and it's not just memory but you're seeing changes in all the all the domain domains of cognition that's where we don't we are not seeing reversibility yet all right we should talk a little bit about fat here um I don't think anybody has made any secret that a really high fat diet is probably not going to do you any favors in terms of cognitive function and your risk of Alzheimer's disease however it can become an interesting conversation when you look at the types of fat and the sources of fat and to that end we have a question from Louise who is wondering whether the saturated fat that's found in coconuts and avocados also increases the risk of Alzheimer's very likely now back in Chicago starting in the late 90s the Chicago health and aging project got started attract a lot of people and the first thing that they reported on was saturated fat and what they found is that those people in Chicago who were getting the most saturated fat think dairy products meat those are the big big sources uh they had oh probably two to three times the risk of Alzheimer's disease so we started to realize okay saturated fat bad actor for the brain as well as for the heart but are there Botanical sources you mentioned One coconut oil avocados not so much avocados have a fat that's very much like olive oil whereas the coconut fat is more saturated fat but the other one you didn't mention is palm oil and palm oil heavily saturated and the reason I'm singling this out is you will see coconut oil and palm oil used in a ton of products you go to the store and and the palm oil is added to peanut butter that coconut oil is in the coconut milk that you might buy at the store I suggest that people avoid them completely both coconut oil palm oil heavily saturated part of the problem not part of the solution all right let's take a question now from dawn who apparently has herself a little sweet tooth like so many of us um and Dawn is wondering whether there might be any sort of connection between sugar and Alzheimer's what do we know there very likely not a an important one um now that said diabetes people who have diabetes have about double the risk of Alzheimer's compared to other people but the question is did Sugar get them there and we now know that that diabetes really starts as insulin resistance which starts as fat accumulation inside your muscle cells that accumulation inside your liver cells so that these cells filled with fat can't pull the sugar out of your blood anymore so the fatty foods that so many of us grew up with that's really the Genesis of of diabetes Now sugar when you're eating sugar if you are insulin resistant the sugar can't go where it's supposed to it doesn't go into your cells and it builds up in the blood but that really wasn't the origin of it that said there is sugar and then there's sugar the sugar in an apple in an orange in a pear those are natural sugars that nature thought this is going to be good for you that will power your brain in a good way which is true the sugar that is in sugar cane goes to the factory they throw out all the fiber and all the pulp and they concentrate it and they put it in your Coca-Cola bottle and that's that's really an unnatural source of hyper-concentrated sugar it may not be a big driver of Alzheimer's but it's just a whole bunch of calories you don't need all right let's see if we can grab a couple of more here there's a few other good ones here Rosa sent this one in ahead of time also kind of looking at research here she says that the Alzheimer's Association says to replace butter with healthy fats like olive oil and is wondering whether olive oil then might be considered an Alzheimer's friendly food okay well they're thinking right because let's say you're having butter well dairy products are loaded with fat and the fat is very heavily saturated fat that's why butter is this solid thing um it's a saturated fat that makes it that way if you go to olive oil the amount of saturated fat in the oil goes way down it goes down to about 14 percent that's good but if you don't use butter or olive oil you went to zero so olive oil better than butter but not as good as just a non-stick pan where you're not using oil at all all right and then also it seems like no matter what our health topic is on a particular week somehow the old red versus white meat conversation comes up and Tabitha is wondering what studies show in terms of the risk of Alzheimer's from eating red meat compared to white meat like chicken neither one is broccoli let me tell you they they really are both high in saturated fat if you take a chicken leg and you take a hunk of roast beef the saturated fat content of the two is about the same if you pull the skin off the the chicken leg you will cut it some because a lot of the fat is there but even so about a quarter of all the calories in a skinless chicken breast chicken breast throughout the dark meat about a quarter of the calories are still fat so um the people are always trying to bargain with is there some kind of meat that isn't isn't really so unhealthy the answer is they're all part of the problem interesting question from James we were just talking about Alzheimer's medication James is wondering whether it's true that almost all of the successful Alzheimer's trials that we hear that have been conducted on animals are absolutely Big Time failures when you try to translate that to humans what do we know there it's been a huge problem researchers have tried to create a road model of Alzheimer's disease a mouse model for example and then you try to come up with some kind of crude way of judging their memory do they remember some tasks that they were trained to do and then researchers have tried to find a compound a candidate drug of some kind that will affect these measures and exactly what the questioner said James said is that things that look promising in these rodent models have just crashed and burned and once you do a human trial which has really strongly pushed people toward a very different kind of research as you probably know you can now create neurological structures on the lab bench without a mouse at all and these uh these so-called brain on the chip kind of things uh there's a whole new technology about creating neurological structures where we can test compounds on them directly that doesn't necessarily solve the problem but we really clearly do need to get away from the animal trials they are expensive they're obviously cruel and you invest so much time and energy in something that ends up being a dead end it's really tragic to see the waste of resources yeah I remember doing a show with one of our colleagues where we talked about that and human relevant methods of research and just how much more quickly they can bring some drugs to Market and at a much lower cost because there's you you're not wasting your time your effort and energy with these other models that just wind up being complete failures and I believe that there's a statistic on our website Dr Barnard where we're talking about roughly like 98 99 of these animal trials with Alzheimer's do not translate whatsoever into human success and that again I mean that's a huge number so when James says almost all of them a 98 99 he's spot on there yes and and this is for kind of obvious reasons um the if you compare uh an animal's behavior to human behavior if you compare their neurological features to human neurological features there are similarities but there are also a number of differences and then when you look at how they may metabolize a compound that you feed to them or that you infuse intravenously they metabolize these things differently as well and their toxicities are often very different so it's been a huge problem of translation and it's ended up being a pretty expensive lesson that that's really not the way that you want to invest your research I think the way you should probably organize another show for that in the future uh that was just a really fascinating episode a little bit of a departure from what we usually do but I I just found the information there it's just so worthwhile uh two more quickies uh number one from Atlanta at 1219 what is more important for Alzheimer's prevention is it diet or is it movement here what would you say what does the statistics bore out the answer is yes dancers diet and movement they're both important now overall I have to say uh for almost every end point diet is much more important than physical exercise keep in mind you're taking in compounds in large quantity uh that break apart that Infuse your circulatory system and bathe the brain in the things that you just ate the foods that you eat also influence your ability to excrete and eliminate toxic chemicals as well so hands down diet is more important than all of these things but the reason that we want to give exercise a fair amount of credit is because we have hard data where you'll have people who who are physically active and you can show their cardiovascular health is not necessarily dramatically better but their brain health sense does in fact tend to be better all right and this is why we're doing the show today by the way Kelly here posted a nice note and not really nice but it's a touching one she said my dad couldn't remember my husband's name over the weekend we've been married for 20 years so he simply reintroduced himself to him again and that is like incredibly touching and heartwarming and just going through that right now myself with uh my wife's family her mom has Alzheimer's disease and um some days we get names some days we don't um but it's it's a hard one as you well know again I mean you've been through this personally and so let's let's end with the question from Amber here Dr Barnard and Amber's question is do you believe that we will ever get to a point where we will be able to say that Alzheimer's disease can be prevented and reversed I think the prevention is where we really want to focus as much as we can because if you make a list of all the conditions you never want to have happen to you Alzheimer's has got to be the top of the list because when you when you've lost your brain function you've really lost everything and you've lost everyone who ever mattered to you I saw this in my own life where when my father my father died about a decade ago but in truth for all intents and purposes he had died years earlier because he had lost his ability to know to know my mom and to know us and to to feel comfortable and his last years were really tough not just for the family but really tough for him as a person so to the extent that we can prevent going down that road that's really important the other reason why prevention is is more important as a focus than reversal is that the Alzheimer's disease process actually destroys brain cells and if you look at the disease process as the years go by the brain is actually being physically destroyed so it's really really a challenge to build that up so where we're really focusing is what are the things that predict this that this may occur let's plug those in as much as we possibly can if it's a medication fair enough but if it's something natural like a dietary intervention and exercise and other factors let's put them to work as maximally as we possibly can and if you're at the early stages where things are just starting to sputter but the brain cells Aren't Dead if at that point we can intervene and say okay yes for the past 60 or 70 years you might not have been taking good care of yourself are there things that we can do now to back up let's do that we've learned that with hypertension we've learned that with atherosclerosis we've seen it with diabetes where all of these things once a person is in trouble you can throw them a life ring and you can pull them back with Alzheimer's that's exactly where the research is going now Dean ornish and his team have been doing some fascinating research on exactly that people who have an early diagnosis can we pull them back I'm very optimistic that the answer there is going to be yes so let's let's hopefully not let this disease run its course let's intervene early all right and you know you want to talk about intervention something kind of quietly happened uh over the uh the last few weeks here that I thought was absolutely extraordinary you shared this with me Monday night when we were at dinner together and that was the U.S Conference of mayors has made great strides in the adoption of a plant-based diet for so many many different reasons um what can you tell us about this and can you even is it possible to understate or or overstate the importance I should say of what this Proclamation actually does this is actually just so huge um as everybody knows Eric Adams when he was elected mayor of New York he did not waste any time he said this city needs to eat in a more helpful way and he instituted a brilliant program at the New York health and hospitals biggest public hospital system in North America huge and you go into the hospital there and they to ask you what you'd like for dinner the default offering is the plant-based offering and if you say well I'm not sure I want that what else do you have they'll offer you something else and it's plant-based too so you could eventually get a chicken wing out of them if you tried but the things that they are really putting front and center are plant-based I'm talking about vegan foods and the payoff is huge the patients love it the staff loves it they're saving money it's been a great success and the writing is on the wall if we want to have not just healthy people today but if you want a healthy young people growing up into adulthood with good eating habits plant-based meals have to be in their schools too so I've got it right here this is actually what Eric Adams brought to the U.S conference and Mayors and it said that cities need to invest in plant-based eating in all of these domains and yes the U.S Council uh conference of Mayors considered it voted and made this their policy they said yes I don't care if you're in New York you're in La you're in Chicago you're in Little Rock wherever you may be plant-based way to go and it is spot on I have a copy of that right in front of me let me just read a little bit of this for the exam roomies um here's the adopted resolution it says a plant-based diet approach has promised to address chronic disease environmental and fiscal burdens facing cities Across the Nation exactly what you just said here's where it gets so exciting though the lead three paragraphs whereas our current trajectory is unsustainable with our constituents being burdened with lifestyle related chronic diseases at record rates with our environment at risk and with our fiscal Outlook burdened by Health Care spending driven primarily by management of Lifestyle related chronic diseases plaguing our people and whereas these issues can be addressed through an intervention changing the food that we eat promote and work to make available to our constituents a plant predominant eating pattern centered on the consumption of whole minimally processed fruits vegetables legumes whole grains nuts and seeds can be beneficial and I'm telling you knowing that the conference of mayors has adopted this resolution it goes on for Pages by the way is just the coolest thing in the entire world to me and so when we talk about what is tangible progress this is a huge huge huge measurable amazing extraordinary step Dr Barnard absolutely and and we're seeing this trend um some years ago the American Medical Association started passing resolutions saying we need plant-based foods in hospitals we need them in schools we need them in food assistance programs we've seen the dietary guidelines for America and say you know what this is a healthy eating pattern as opposed to a generation ago when people would say well gee where do you get your protein those questions have been answered and we're now seeing this as a solution and now the Mayors and I got to tell you if there's one job that is more challenging than any other it's looking at the health conditions that are happening in urban areas really all across uh the United States and and around the world for them to say yep I think this is where our solution is going to lie going to lie that's huge progress and a sign of great things to come absolutely and for those cynics Among Us myself included a lot of times who think that money drives everything believe you me these resolutions spell that out and I really am hopeful that Mayors and governors around the country also will read these resolutions and listen to this because they list also specifically in here that these preventable diseases are the primary drivers quote of the nation's 4.1 trillion dollar annual Health Care spending 4.1 trillion and at a time when money is at a premium and we're always looking to cut and to save this seems to be a really affordable and just complete solution to a lot of what we're facing in terms of our health challenges and if nothing else 4.1 trillion is going to make somebody stand up and take a close look at this well my hat is off to Eric Anderson's leadership and to all the Mayors who are saying this is the this is the way to go absolutely and look you know Eric Adams the wonderful mayor of the city of New York and you and I last week a week ago today as a matter of fact had our big exam room live and in person up in New York and I just I cannot thank everyone who turned out enough for showing up and supporting the show and helping us celebrate 15 million extraordinary downloads here uh it really was so much fun just to share the stage Dr Barnard with you and Dr Rob osfeld and Dr Michelle mcmacken of course rip esselstyn from plant strong he was there as well and I mean just a sold out auditorium at the Museum of the city of New York and just such energy in the room that night it really was just a blast man it was great it was a great place um but more than that it was a great opportunity for people to share um their experiences with these things their questions uh their predictions for the future so hats off to you Chuck thank you for all you have done to bring this forward and thank you for um being a a brilliant host for a really really fun evening no it was my pleasure I love getting the opportunity to spend time with the exam roomies and hearing their stories and Journeys back to health and you know I can't wait also to meet a lot more exam roomies coming up August 10th through 12th at the International Conference on nutrition and Medicine here in Washington DC obviously today we talked a lot about Alzheimer's disease I'm sure that's going to be one of the topics that's going to be hit at the conference in fact the very first day we're talking about uh food and brain function we have several presenters on that topic we're also tackling a couple things uh we're tackling the new view of protein it's not a question of are you getting enough you are it's a question of uh what type is best for you and the whole idea that you need meat for protein has been thrown out we're going to tackle that in a new way and at lunchtime on the first day actually the people who are the innovators behind New York's uh system of the vegan meals in their hospitals they're going to be in DC they're going to present their data and they're going to cook their executive chef is coming down and we are going to actually taste the food that's all on day one uh the rest of the conference is really really cool we're going to talk about tackling diabetes technically breast cancer many many other issues we can have a big two-hour debate all about what Govi and the other weight loss drugs so uh the the International Conference on nutrition medicine this year I think it's going to be our best ever yeah I'm looking forward to that that weight loss panel that debate um I'm privileged enough you you invited me on with that but we're going to be joined by Dr Jamie Kane Dr Garth Davis Dr Jim Loomis Dr Hana kaliova Dr Steve lome uh Dr Vanita Vermont I mean just it's going to be a really well-rounded conversation um honestly it's two hours but I'm wondering like how we're going to be able to get all the information out because there's so much ground to cover with that one on Friday well but when people when people are done they're going to know about what these drugs do what they don't do what the risks are what the benefits are everything and then comparing it with what's what is the advantage of using food and doing it in the right way we're also going to talk about surgery and all the other issues which are complicated and need to get a good airing that's all going to be covered in detail but that's just one small part of a huge fund conference and if people come for one reason uh one other reason it's the food you know it's conference food you'll ever have and that's for a reason we want somebody who's new to this to realize it's not just information but actually uh you're going to enjoy the food that's going to be on your plate from now on absolutely come for the food stay for the information stay for the podcast we're going to be taping episodes all throughout the conference I'm going to be downstairs right outside the conference doors doing a bunch of Instagram lives and then also we have a podcast Studio one floor up where we're going to be recording episodes that we'll release and I know uh also coming uh Senator Cory Booker will be there Dr Michael Greger Dr Dean ornish Dr Christy Funk uh Dr Andrew Freeman who will be on the program next week he's going to be there Dr Gemma Newman my partner in crime from one healthy the world she's going to be there Brenda Davis Dr David I mean the list just goes on and on and on it really is a who's who in the world of nutrition it's such a fun conference uh every single year so it's a great undertaking but I do hope that you all get the opportunity to come by and hang out with us and really raise your health IQ I mean not a point or two I mean we're talking like this has got to be a good 10 Point Health IQ raising exercise here over the course of the three days plus CME credits are available so pcrm.org icnm to reserve your seat today August 10th through 12th at the Grand Hyatt in Washington D.C Dr Barnard I just cannot wait my friend I I'm look this is I think my sixth conference that I'll be going to uh you've been there since day one you still get as fired up as ever about this yeah I I do because science is always moving forward and at icnm is the place where people come to unveil what is new the things that are going to be really influencing medical practice and what people need to know in the future so it's going to really be a blast all right guys today's episode of the exam room live has been powered by the Gregory J Ryder memorial fund our friends you know they support organizations like the Physicians committee that carry on graves love for Animals by promoting plant-based health and working to end animal abuse while emphasizing programs that promote systemic change and also benefit people so when I tell you they're doing a lot of good for a lot of the world believe you me that is exactly what they're doing so find out everything that they're up to by visiting their website right now online at gregoryriderfund.org that's Gregory Ryder r-e-i-t-e-r-fund dot org and it was great by the way Dr Barnard to see Allison Mahoney from the Ryder fund up at the show in New York last week as well is fun to bring her up on stage and just give her a shout out because she has been our biggest supporter our first supporter who's still with us on the exam room uh since day one I love her with all my heart she really does help to make the show possible every week yeah I was gonna say it was so fun to see Allison again at the New York event and Allison if you're watching thank you for being there thank you for all of your support to make to make this all happen and thank you Dr Barnard for being here today and raising our health IQs learned a lot about Alzheimer's my friend thanks for spreading the info with us yeah I'm hoping that this information is going to help everybody to have a little added protection against this disease I have no doubt that it will my friend none whatsoever I also want to say thank you to the crew behind the scenes for making the magic happen thank you guys so very much as always and to you exam roomies thanks for hanging out with us building this healthy Community together and as a reminder if you really do feel like you've raised your health IQ by a point or two like this video And subscribe to the channel here on YouTube it goes a long way to helping get this information out to those who need it the most and for everyone here at the Physicians committee I am the weight loss Champion Chuck Carroll we will talk to you again very very soon but until then keep it plant-based

Channel: Physicians Committee

Views: 72,889

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Id: R4_njrrlux0

Length: 50min 44sec (3044 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 19 2023