“Persons with dementia often find themselves in confusing and upsetting situations but gradually lack the necessary coping skills to help them out. This can sometimes lead to verbally or physically aggressive behaviors. Many caregivers tell us one of the hardest things they cope with is helping people with Alzheimer’s in frustrating situations.”

Dr. Elizabeth Edgerly, Ph.D., expert researcher — is our chief program officer of a blog called Alzheimer’s Association (in Northern California).

Alzheimer’s Might be “Brain Diabetes”

It’s becoming increasingly clear that the same pathological process that leads to insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes may also hold true for your brain. As you over-indulge on sugar and grains, your brain becomes overwhelmed by the consistently high levels of insulin and eventually shuts down its insulin signaling, leading to impairments in your thinking and memory abilities, and eventually causing permanent brain damage.

Regularly consuming more than 25 grams of fructose per day will dramatically increase your risk of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. Consuming too much fructose will inevitably wreak havoc on your body’s ability to regulate proper insulin levels.

Although fructose is relatively “low glycemic” on the front end, it reduces the affinity for insulin for its receptor leading to chronic insulin resistance and elevated blood sugar on the back end. So, while you may not notice a steep increase in blood sugar immediately following fructose consumption, it is likely changing your entire endocrine system’s ability to function properly behind the scenes.

Additionally, fructose has other modes of neurotoxicity, including causing damage to the circulatory system upon which the health of your nervous system depends, as well as profoundly changing your brain’s craving mechanism, often resulting in excessive hunger and subsequent consumption of additional empty carbohydrate-based calories.

In one study from UCLA, researchers found that rats fed a fructose-rich and omega-3 fat deficient diet (similar to what is consumed by many Americans) developed both insulin resistance and impaired brain function in just six weeks.⁶

Plus, when your liver is busy processing fructose (which your liver turns into fat), it severely hampers its ability to make ^{cholesterol, an essential building block of your brain crucial to its health. This is yet another important facet that explains how and why excessive fructose consumption is so detrimental to your health. Decreasing fructose intake is one of the most important moves you can take in decreasing the risk of Alzheimer’s disease in your lifetime.}

Tips for avoiding Alzheimer’s Disease is Part 2 tomorrow. 😉

More Tips for Avoiding Alzheimer’s Disease

The beauty of following a healthy diet is that it helps treat and prevent all chronic degenerative diseases, from the common ones like heart disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity and Alzheimer’s to the ones you have never heard of or can’t even pronounce.

The first step is to eat healthy, maintaining exercise balanced with rest and practice healthy habits in addressing Alzheimer’s disease, which is currently at epidemic proportions, with 5.4 million Americans – including one in eight people aged 65 and over – living with the disease.7 By 2050, this is expected to jump to 16 million, and in the next 20 years it is projected that Alzheimer’s will affect one in four Americans. People we need to live healthier if not to help ourselves our future young ones.

In spite of how common ^{memory loss is among Westerners, it is NOT a “normal” part of aging. While even mild “senior moments” may be caused by the same brain lesions associated with Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia, these cognitive changes are by no means inevitable! People who experience very little decline in their cognitive function up until their deaths have been found (post-mortem) to be free of brain lesions, showing that it’s entirely possible to prevent the damage from occurring in the first place and one of the best ways to do this is by leading a healthy lifestyle.}

I can’t remember anything to put down for today??

Go to striveforgoodhealth.com and read one of our classic topics on Alzheimer’s Disease and see how it can relate with Diabetes!!

Here’s one of striveforgoodhealth.com’s classics and I think you mind enjoy whether reading it the first time or over again.  The human memory on average doesn’t remember everything it read or saw the first time unless with a special gift like a few for the many that have this talent in the world, like Ms. M. Henner (an actress, producer) for example who was given this gift

.  At one time Alzheimer’s disease was a disease considered with unknown etiology (or cause). Today it is considered different in the eyes of many in the medical profession. By a Dr. Mercola a physician who founded Mercola.com (Mercola.com is now the world’s top natural health resource site, with over 1.5 million subscribers.) feels this about alzeiher’s disease: “The cause of the debilitating, and fatal, brain disease Alzheimer’s is conventionally said to be a mystery.

While we know that certain diseases, like type 2 diabetes, are definitively connected to the foods you eat, Alzheimer’s is generally thought to strike without warning or reason.

That is, until recently.

Now, a growing body of research suggests there may be a powerful connection between the foods you eat and your risk of Alzheimer’s disease and dementia, via similar pathways that cause type 2 diabetes. Some have even re-named Alzheimer’s as “type 3 diabetes.”“

Can You Eat Your Way to Alzheimer’s?

In a recent animal study, researchers from Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island were able to induce many of the characteristic brain changes seen with Alzheimer’s disease (disorientation, confusion, inability to learn and remember) by interfering with insulin signaling in their brains.¹

Know that faulty insulin (and leptin, another hormone) signaling is an underlying cause for insulin resistance, which, of course, typically leads to type 2 diabetes. However, while insulin is usually associated with its role in keeping your ^{blood sugar levels in a healthy range, it also plays a role in brain signaling. When researchers disrupted the proper signaling of insulin in the brain, it resulted in dementia.}

What does this have to do with your diet? Let us go back to one of my articles on diabetes and how it impacts your diet. It states “The foods we eat that contain starches, carbohydrates, calories are made up of sugar. When food reaches our stomach in time digestion starts to take place where these foods are broken down in the stomach into individual or complex sugar molecules ( glucose being one of the most common and important ones). The glucose then passes from our stomach into our bloodstream when it reaches the liver 60 to 80 % of the glucose gets stored in that organ turning glucose into inactive glucose that’s converted to glycogen. The purpose for glycogen is when our glucose is low and our body needing energy we have this extra stored sugar, glycogen, to rely on. This is done by the liver which allows the sugar to be stored and released back into the bloodstream if we need it=energy, since nothing is in our stomach at that time, in that case scenario). When glucose=an active sugar, it is our energy for our cells and tissues and is a sugar ready to be utilized by the body where it is needed, by many organs. Think of a car for one moment, and what makes it run? That would be gas/fuel for it to function. The same principle with glucose in your bloodstream=fuel for the human body so we can function, for without it we wouldn’t survive. That is the problem with a person that has diabetes. They eat, they break the food down, the glucose gets in the blood but the glucose fuel can’t be used due to lack of or NO insulin at all. Insulin allows glucose to pass into our cells and tissues to be used as energy/fuel for the body parts to work. Glucose is used as the principle source of energy (It is used by the brain for energy, the muscles for both energy and some storage, liver for more glucose storage=that is where glucose is converted to glycogen, and even stored in fat tissue using it for triglyceride production). Glucose does get sent to other organs for more storage, as well. Insulin plays that vital role in allowing glucose to be distributed throughout the body. Without insulin the glucose has nowhere to go.” So how does this impact your brain thinking? “This new focus on the Alzheimer’s/Diabetes/Insulin connection follows a growing recognition of insulin’s role in the brain. Until recently, the hormone was typecast as a regulator of blood sugar, giving the cue for muscles, liver and fat cells to extract sugar from the blood and either use it for energy or store it as fat. We now know that it is also a master multitasker: it helps neurons, particularly in the hippocampus and frontal lobe, take up glucose for energy, and it also regulates neurotransmitters, like acetylcholine, which are crucial for memory and learning.” What is effected with Alzheimer’s disease? Your memory and learning, So your diet plays a big role in Alzheimer’s disease.”

Over-consumption of sugars and grains is what ultimately causes your body to be incapable of “hearing” the proper signals from insulin and leptin, leaving you insulin resistant in both body and brain. Alzheimer’s disease was tentatively dubbed “type 3 diabetes” in early 2005 when researchers learned that the pancreas is not the only organ that produces insulin. Your brain also produces insulin, and this brain insulin is necessary for the survival of your brain cells.

If You Have Diabetes, Your Risk of Alzheimer’s Increases Dramatically

Diabetes is linked to a 65 percent increased risk of developing Alzheimer’s, which may be due, in part, because insulin resistance and/or diabetes appear to accelerate the development of plaque in your brain, which is a hallmark of Alzheimer’s. Separate research has found that impaired insulin response was associated with a 30 percent higher risk of Alzheimer’s disease, and overall dementia and cognitive risks were associated with high fasting serum insulin, insulin resistance, impaired insulin secretion and glucose intolerance.

A drop in insulin production in your brain may contribute to the degeneration of your brain cells, mainly by depriving them of glucose, and studies have found that people with lower levels of insulin and insulin receptors in their brain often have Alzheimer’s disease (people with type 2 diabetes often wind up with low levels of insulin in their brains as well). As explained in New Scientist, which highlighted this latest research:

What’s more, it encourages the process through which neurons change shape, make new connections and strengthen others. And it is important for the function and growth of blood vessels, which supply the brain with oxygen and glucose.

As a result, reducing the level of insulin in the brain can immediately impair cognition. Spatial memory, in particular, seems to suffer when you block insulin uptake in the hippocampus… Conversely, a boost of insulin seems to improve its functioning.

When people frequently gorge on fatty, sugary food, their insulin spikes repeatedly until it sticks at a high level. Muscle, liver and fat cells then stop responding to the hormone, meaning they don’t mop up glucose and fat in the blood. As a result, the pancreas desperately works overtime to make more insulin to control the glucose – and levels of the two molecules skyrocket.

The pancreas can’t keep up with the demand indefinitely, however, and as time passes people with type 2 diabetes often end up with abnormally low levels of insulin.”

Eastern equine encephalitis virus (EEEV) is a zoonotic alphavirus and arbovirus, and was first recognized in horses in 1831 in Massachusetts. The first confirmed human cases were identified in New England in 1938. EEEV is present today in North, Central and South America, and the Caribbean. In rare cases, those that contract the virus will develop the serious neuroinvasive disease, Eastern equine encephalitis (EEE). From 2009 to 2018, between three (3) and fifteen (15) cases of EEE were reported annually in the U.S. EEE may also be commonly referred to as Triple E or sleeping sickness. EEEV is a vector-borne disease that is transmitted to humans through the bite of an infected mosquito. Culiseta melanura is the primary vector among birds, but this mosquito species does not typically feed on humans. It is believed that EEEV is mainly transmitted to humans and horses by bridge vectors that have contracted the virus by feeding on infected birds. Bridge vector species of mosquitoes may include Coquillettidia pertubans, Aedes sollicitans, and Ochlerotatus canadensis. The risk of contracting the EEE virus is highest during the summer months, and those who live and work near wetland and swamp areas are at higher risk of infection. EEEV is only spread to humans via mosquito bite, and cannot be transmitted directly by other humans or horses. There is an EEEV vaccine available for horses, and owners are encouraged to discuss vaccination with their veterinarian.

A Global View of Eastern Equine Encephalitis

EEE affects areas throughout North and South America, with outbreaks occurring mainly in the eastern coastal areas of the United States and Canada, the Caribbean, and Argentina.

Know Your Mosquitoes

In the U.S., Culiseta melanura is the mosquito responsible for the spread of EEEV in the mosquito-bird-mosquito cycle. Known as the black-tailed mosquito, Cs. melanura can be found in swamps from the Great Lakes and Maine to southern Florida and southeastern Texas. It is distinguished by its unusually long, curved dark-scaled proboscis. This mosquito is also unique because it overwinters as larvae, as opposed to most mosquito species that overwinter as adults or eggs.

EEEV is mainly transmitted to humans by bridge vectors that contract the virus by feeding on infected birds. Bridge vectors may include Aedes, Coquillettidia, and Culex species.

Aedes mosquitoes have distinct black and white markings on their body and legs. They bite during the daytime only, with the highest levels of activity occur in the early morning and evening hours. Members of the Aedes genus are known vectors of EEE, Zika virus, dengue, yellow fever, West Nile virus, and chikungunya.

Coquillettidia mosquitoes have slender bodies and long legs. They are commonly found in humid, low-lying areas that have warm summer and lots of vegetation. In addition to acting as vectors for EEE, Coquillettidia mosquitoes are also known to transmit West Nile virus to humans.

Culex mosquitoes are brown with whitish markings on the abdomen. They typically bite at dusk and at night, and are known to vector several diseases including EEE, West Nile virus, Japanese encephalitis, St. Louis encephalitis, and avian malaria.

“Heart Failure Online is dedicated to providing information regarding heart failure to patients and their families.

We have worked hard to break down the components of heart failure, starting with an overview of the organ systems involved and progressing through how each organ system is affected, methods of prevention, treatment options, and much more.”

Heart Failure.org

I am overjoyed that I do not need a heart transplant at this time.

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/transplant.html#QDobMLkKHBQcU7XK.99

“Whether by a Mack truck or by heart failure or faulty lungs, death happens.  But life isn’t just about avoiding death, is it.  It’s about living.”

Charity Sunshine Tillemann-Dick (is a soprano, composer and presenter. A recipient of two double lung transplants, she speaks and performs frequently at concerts, conferences and events around the United States.)

Treatments for CHF:

Heart failure caused by an excessive workload is curable by treating the primary disease, such as anemia or thyrotoxicosis or hypertension or diabetes. Also, curable are forms caused by anatomical problems such as a heart valve defect. These defects can be surgically corrected.

However, for the common forms of heart failure due to damaged heart muscle no known cure (like a heart attack that damages the heart muscle where the attack took place on the organ) but prevention of it happening again can take place in many cases through treatment of the disease or illness with being compliant in following up with your doctor for the disease or illness and being compliant in following doctor’s orders. The worst thing you can do is ignore it. The treatment seeks to improve patients quality of life and length of survival through lifestyle change and drug therapy.

Patients can minimize the effect t of heart failure by controlling the risk factors for heart disease they may have. Obvious steps include: Don’t smoke or quit smoking, lose weight if necessary, abstaining from alcohol, and making those dietary changes to reduce the amount of salt and fat consumed Regular, modest exercise is also helpful for many patinets, though the amount and intensity should be carefully monitored by a physician.

Even with lifestyle changes, most heart failure patients must take medication. Many patients receive 2 or more meds. Types of medication given: ACE inhibitors, Digitalis, Diuretics, Hydralazine, and Nitrates.

These are some of the meds given for heart failure. Not all medications are suitable for patients, and more than one drug may be needed. Always review the list your pharmacist provides in the action, side effects, with instructions of how to take the drug to make it most effective in your body with what to look for while on this medication to keep you the patient most informed on what you should know.

Results of studies over the years have placed more emphasis on the use of drugs known as angiotensin converting enzymes (ACE) inhibitors. Several studies have indicated that ACE inhibitors improve survival among heart failure patients and may slow perhaps even prevent the loss of the heart pumping activity. This drug prevents the transfer of your enzyme Angiotensin 1 to convert to Angiotensin 2 which prevents the vessels in your body to do vasoconstriction which prevents the pressure in the bloodstream to raise = high B/P (hypertension). This prevents stress to the heart, due to high B/this causes blood to get to the heart slowly and more difficult causing the heart to pump harder but the ACE inhibitor with allowing vasodilation (opening of vessels) keeping pressure down to make the job easier= less stress on the heart. Originally these medications where for patients in the treatment of hypertension but they help patients with heart failure, among other things, decreasing the pressure inside the blood vessels causing the heart to do its job easier.

Digitalis increases the force of the heart’s contractions, helping to improve circulation in the body.

Diuretics are for reducing the amount of fluid in the bloodstream and body by releasing them via the kidneys and having us void the excess out in our urine, these are useful for patients with fluid retention.

Those who aren’t prescribed or cannot take these meds already mentioned may be given a hydralazine medication and/or a drug in the Nitrate classification, each of which help relax tension in the blood vessels to improve blood flow. Also, both Hydralazine and Nitrates function is they cause vasodilation in the vessels improving blood flow to the heart.

Sometimes heart failure is life threatening. Usually, this happens when drug therapy and lifestyle changes fail to control its symptoms. In such cases, a heart transplant may be the only treatment option. However, candidates for transplantation often have to wait months or even years before a suitable donor heart is found.

Studies over the years indicate that some transplant candidates improve during this waiting period through drug treatment and other therapy, and can be removed from the transplant list.

Transplant candidates who do not improve sometimes need mechanical pumps, which are attached to the heart. Called left ventricular assist device (LVADs), the machine takes over part or virtually all of the heart’s blood-pumping activity. However, current LVADs are not permanent solutions for heart failure but are considered bridges to transplantation. Worldwide, about 3,500 heart transplants were performed annually. The vast majority of these are performed in the United States (2,000-2,300 annually). Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California has performed the most heart transplants in the last three consecutive years performing 95 transplants in 2012 alone. About 800,000 people have a Class IV heart defect indicating a new organ. The degrees of CHF are I, II, III and IV. In learning more about CHF with heart transplants (including becoming a candidate for one) go to wwwtransplantexperience.com or even hearttransplant.com.

Another surgical procedure for heart failure that is available in America is cardiomyoplasty. This is a surgical procedure in which healthy muscle from another part of the body is wrapped around the heart to provide support for the failing heart. Most often the latissimusHYPERLINK “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latissimus_dorsi_muscle” HYPERLINK “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latissimus_dorsi_muscle”dorsiHYPERLINK “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latissimus_dorsi_muscle” muscle is used for this purpose. A special pacemaker is implanted to make the skeletal muscle contract. The electrical stimulator icauses the back muscle to contract, pumping the blood from the heart (this allows the heart to do its job more effectively).

As stated, the heart loses some of its blood pumping ability as a natural consequence of aging.  How- ever, a number of other factors can lead to a potentially life-threatening loss of pumping activity.

As a symptom of underlying heart disease, heart failure is closely associated with the major risk factors for coronary heart disease:  smoking, high cholesterol levels, hypertension (persistent high blood pressure), diabetes= abnormal blood sugar levels, and obesity.  A person can change or eliminate those risk factors and thus lower their risk of developing or aggravating their heart disease and heart failure through healthy habits performed routinely, proper dieting, and balancing rest with exercise.

Among prominent risk factors, hypertension-HTN (high blood pressure) and diabetes are PARTICULARLY IMPORTANT.  Uncontrolled HTN increases the risk of heart failure by 200 %, compared to those who do not have hypertension.   Moreover, the degree of risk appears directly related to the severity of the high blood pressure.

Persons with diabetes have about a two to eight fold greater risk of heart failure than those without diabetes.  Women with diabetes have a greater risk of heart failure than men with diabetes.  Part of the risk comes from the diabetes association with other risk factors for heart disease such as high cholesterol or obesity or other risk factors.  However, the disease process of diabetes also damages the heart muscle.

The presence of coronary disease is among the greatest risks for heart failure.  Muscle damage and scarring caused by a heart attack greatly increase the risk of heart failure.  Cardiac arrhythmias, or irregular heartbeats, also raise heart failure risk.  Any disorder that causes abnormal swelling or thickening of the heart sets the stage for heart failure.

In some people, heart failure arises from problems with heart valves, the flap-like structures that help regulate blood flow through the heart.  Infections in the heart are another source of increased risk for heart failure.

A single risk factor may be sufficient to cause heart failure, but a combination of factors dramatically increases the risk.  Advanced age adds to the potential impact of any heart failure risk.

Finally, genetic abnormalities contribute to the risk for certain types of heart disease, which in turn may lead to heart failure.  However, in most instances, a specific genetic link to heart failure has not been identified.

SO LIVE AS HEALTHY AS POSSIBLE IN YOUR ROUTINE HABITS,  YOUR DIETING OF THE 4 FOOD GROUPS, MAINTAINING YOUR WEIGHT IN A THEREPEUTIC RANGE (look as calculating BMI online for free to find out what your weight range for your height is), and BALANCING REST WITH EXERCISE TO HELP DECREASE THE CHANCE OF GETTING HEART FAILURE.  Go to healthyusa.tsfl.com to learn what Dr. Anderson through his book of “Dr. A.’s Healthy Habits” and me as your health coach could provide you within a reachable cost.  To just view what can be offered to you for no price with no hacking go to healthyusa.tsfl.com and take a peek;)