UCI Study on the Brains of the Very Elderly

Alzheimer's, cardiovascular, and other chronic diseases; biomarkers, lifestyle, supplements, drugs, and health care.
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Welcomeaboard
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UCI Study on the Brains of the Very Elderly

Post by Welcomeaboard »

Try this on, as seen on 60 minutes.

Good alcohol, exercise, normal weight to slightly overweight, high blood pressure, etc.

Vitamins do nothing, however there were no details as to whether they took bioavailable curcumin or the 25hydroxyvitamin D3 levels or any levels of vitamins monitored in the blood, etc.

They showed people with plaques and tangles with AD and others without AD, they are doing pet scans of people to determine, if the plaque people will develop AD, eventually, etc.

Many that they thought had AD, after they died they did brain biopsy after death showed micro strokes and no plaques and tangles.

Anyways it was a 5 year study or so and they are doing another 5 year study.

The challenge is to find their studies and then read them looking for the parameters they used and then discuss any flaws or limitations that would lead to a lack of a proper knowledge base, etc. That also would mean that their conclusions were flawed in some areas or lacking the proper information to draw the correct conclusion.

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Gina99
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Re: UCI Study on the Brains of the Very Elderly

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Welcome - I did see this as well. The link: [urlhttp://www.cbs.com/shows/60_minutes/video/dRWD ... arrel-90-/][/url]
(if I didn't post the link correctly, just got to www.cbs.com and go to 60 minutes and you can watch clips or the whole item. I was a long segment.

This was a really long study started back in 1981 with 14,000 I believe they said. Interesting point, as Welcome said, that after autopsy, some with dementia or AD had no amyloid, and some without did have amyloid - plaques and tangles. No mention of APOE. At the end it was mentioned what they have seen is a series of mini-infarcts resulting in loss of communication between cortex and other parts of the brain. They did mention the PET scan used to look for amyloid.

But the question would be why do some progress and others do not. Diet? Genetics? Other takeaways: in older folk, low blood pressure bad, obese never good, underweight not good. But I didn't hear what the 'older' age was? 80 or 90 Plus?
Welcomeaboard
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Re: UCI Study on the Brains of the Very Elderly

Post by Welcomeaboard »

90 plus was the age of people they had on 60 minutes, they did not say the age of people in 1981. As if they were 90 plus then, you could expect that out of that group they would be dead. They did not say whether they started with people in their 60's(that I can recall) and tracked them until death, however they did say that they started with the 14,000 and they decided to find as many that were alive now as they could. That number was over 1600 that they found that were still alive. So deductive reasoning and the fact that LeisureWorld(n/k/a Laguna Woods) allowed in their blurb that they showed in or around 1969 that anyone 52 and up could retire there, that some were that age, they may have had a higher age requirement?

Anyways, finding the actual published studies will help.
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SusanJ
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Re: UCI Study on the Brains of the Very Elderly

Post by SusanJ »

My first thought on hearing this was, yes, but how many more people might have made it to 90 with proper supplementation?

When I heard that many didn't take vitamins, I thought, well maybe they lived without vitamins because they didn't have genetic variants like MTHFR. So look at my folks, from whom I obviously got MTHFR. They would have definitely benefited greatly from supplementing the B complex.

I would definitely like to see if they looked at common genetic variants, beyond APOE4.
SpunkyPup
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Re: UCI Study on the Brains of the Very Elderly

Post by SpunkyPup »

study is to published at end of the week.

supplements were not found to extend life from what I read so we do not know more until study is released.
Gina99
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Re: UCI Study on the Brains of the Very Elderly

Post by Gina99 »

Recap by Baby boomer website of the UCI study, if you visit the website there are links to Dr. Kawas talk on YouTube. I have not seen it yet. http://www.baby-boomer-retirement.com/2 ... llage.html



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Julie G
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Re: UCI Study on the Brains of the Very Elderly

Post by Julie G »

Nice recap, Gina. I'll look forward to the videos later today. I found the reduced oxygen connection particularly interesting in light of all you're unearthing with the sleep apnea connection.
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