Alzheimer’s — A Disease Fed by Sugar
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2015/08/13/sugar-alzheimers-disease-link.aspx?e_cid=20150813Z1_DNL_art_1&utm_source=dnl&utm_medium=email&utm_content=art1&utm_campaign=20150813Z1&et_cid=DM84740&et_rid=1073972426
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2015/08/13/sugar-alzheimers-disease-link.aspx?e_cid=20150813Z1_DNL_art_1&utm_source=dnl&utm_medium=email&utm_content=art1&utm_campaign=20150813Z1&et_cid=DM84740&et_rid=1073972426
By Dr. Mercola
As of 2013, 5.2 million Americans had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, a severe form of dementia,1 and Alzheimer’s diagnoses are projected to triple by 2050.2,3
Over half a million Americans die from the disease each year, making it the third leading cause of death in the US, right behind heart disease and cancer.4,5
Considering there’s no known cure and few if any effective treatments, it’s really important to pay attention to prevention if you want to avoid becoming an Alzheimer’s statistic.
The good news is that your lifestyle choices such as diet, exercise, and sleep can have a significant impact on your risk.
As noted by Dr. Richard Lipton6 of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine where they study healthy aging, lifestyle changes “look more promising than the drug studies so far.”
High-Sugar Diet Raises Your Risk of Alzheimer’s
Mounting research suggests our modern diet is playing a significant role in the skyrocketing prevalence of Alzheimer’s. Processed foods tend to be nearly devoid of healthy fat while being excessive in sugar, and this combination appears to be at the heart of the problem.
Most people (especially Americans) are on a processed food diet, and this virtually guarantees you’ll end up getting inverted ratios of carbs and fats, not to mention both are typically inferior due to processing and adulteration.
The connection between sugar and Alzheimer’s was first broached in 2005, when the disease was tentatively dubbed "type 3 diabetes.” At that time researchers discovered that your brain produces insulin necessary for the survival of your brain cells.
A toxic protein called ADDL removes insulin receptors from nerve cells, thereby rendering those neurons insulin resistant, and as ADDLs accumulate, your memory begins to deteriorate.
Previous research has also shown diabetics have a doubled risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.
Now, researchers are again warning that Alzheimer’s appears to be intricately linked to insulin resistance. In one recent study,7 the researchers used brain scans to assess 150 middle-aged people who were at risk of Alzheimer’s but showed no signs of it at the outset of the study.
As reported by The Huffington Post:8
“Brain scans revealed that greater insulin resistance was linked to less sugar in key parts of the brain, often affected by Alzheimer's.
Insulin is the hormone that helps your body use sugar from the foods you eat, and either converts it into energy or stores it away. Insulin resistance is when your body's response to a regular level of the hormone is reduced, creating a need for more insulin.
‘If you don’t have as much fuel, you’re not going to be as adept at remembering something or doing something,’ the study's lead author Auriel Willette...
‘This is important with Alzheimer’s disease, because over the course of the disease there is a progressive decrease in the amount of blood sugar used in certain brain regions. Those regions end up using less and less.
When this happens, the study's authors believe, certain parts of the brain can't carry out complex processes, like forming memories.”
