What Makes a Healthy Brain?

Key tips for a healthy brain ahead of Brain Awareness Week from March 13 to 19
Brain Awareness Week from March 13^th to 19^th focuses on increasing public awareness of the progress and benefits of brain research. This cause is extremely important as it works towards securing further research into brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s and anxiety disorders which affect a large number of Australians. The National Institute of Dementia Research (NHMRC) said that there are currently 413,000 people living with dementia in Australia today.

It is crucial that we take measures to keep our brains sharp and healthy when we are younger, as human mental decline generally begins before the age of 40, but continuous mental stimulation can protect the brain against this decline. Stimulating the brain by learning new skills and challenging ourselves can lead to better performance in the parts of the brain that we don’t tend to use every single day.For Founder and CEO, Ruth Samer, of Care For Family, one of the leaders in the aged-care industry, this is the ideal time to highlight the key habits and activities which can assist in maintaining a healthy brain for people of any age.

“There are some key habits that we can be consistent with in our day-to-day lives and that seniors can adopt in-order to maintain a healthy brain and fight the likelihood of developing brain diseases,” says Ruth.

Check out below for some key tips for maintaining a healthy brain in-order to fight brain diseases:

• Brain stimulation – Learning how to use technologies such as tablets and smartphones, doing puzzles, drawing and painting are all great ways of encouraging mental stimulation. If you usually watch television for entertainment, you could swap it for a book instead. These activities stimulate new connections between nerve cells, which ultimately provides a hedge against future cell loss.
• Physical exercise – Exercise has many positive effects on brain health such as increased heart rate which pumps more oxygen to the brain, stimulating the growth of new cell connections. Exercising in the morning can also spike brain activity and prepare you for any mental stresses that may occur throughout the day.

Take advantage of any opportunity to do physical exercise by using the stairs instead of the elevator or using your lunch break to take a brisk walk. Some exercise states can produce euphoria, but even just twelve-minute spells of activity can release serotonin, dopamine, and noradrenaline. Exercise is also the ideal way to free your mind and minimise stress at the end of a busy day.

• Wellbeing – Drink alcohol and coffee in moderation, don’t smoke or use illegal drugs and enjoy physical activity but make ‘safety first’ a priority by wearing a helmet, driving safely and taking any head injury seriously. Having regular checks for blood pressure, diabetes, heart rate and cholesterol will also help you keep your wellbeing in check.
• Manage stress effectively – Stress hormones can kill nerve cells in animals and are thought to do the same in humans, which is a good reason why you should learn how to manage your stress and anxiety effectively. With approximately 14% of Australians being affected by an anxiety disorder within a 12-month period, we must ensure that we have tried out de-stressors such as physical exercise, meditation, and sufficient sleep to see what works best for us. Maintaining a good routine is also a great way of relieving stresses on the brain such as anxiety and confusion. This is especially helpful for seniors and their caregivers.

• Eating right – Your brain is a high-performance machine that needs the best quality fuel possible. There is growing evidence that eating the right foods for your brain can help reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s by approximately a third (says a study by researchers at Rush University Medical Centre in Chicago). Some of the foods they suggest for a healthy brain are vegetables, nuts, berries, beans, whole grains, fish, poultry and olive oil.

Your brain not only requires a well-balanced, low cholesterol and low saturated animal fat diet – it heavily requires glucose which your blood supplies to your brain at a steady rate. Glucose is the main fuel needed in-order to keep your brain cells alive and functioning, as it provides the necessary energy to allow brain proteins to build cells and produce chemicals for nerves to effectively communicate and repair damage. Glucose can be found in foods such as nuts, seeds, vegetables, grains, pasta, shellfish and legumes.