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cognitive problems

A few slow-paced breaths are enough to significantly reduce physiological stress

January 31, 2022 by SharpBrains

Wel­come to a new edi­tion of Sharp­Brains’ e‑newsletter, shar­ing impor­tant brain & men­tal health news plus a cou­ple fun brain teasers to test your men­tal self-rota­tion skills.

#1. Study: Edu­ca­tion and lifestyle helped over a mil­lion old­er Amer­i­cans avoid seri­ous cog­ni­tive prob­lems in 2017

Let’s kick­start 2022 with some good news: “The preva­lence of seri­ous cog­ni­tive prob­lems in the US pop­u­la­tion aged 65 and old­er declined from 12.2% to 10.0% between 2008 and 2017. Had the preva­lence remained at the 2008 lev­els, there would have been an addi­tion­al 1.13 mil­lion old­er Amer­i­cans with seri­ous cog­ni­tive prob­lems in 2017.”

#2. Study: A few slow-paced breaths are enough to sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduce phys­i­o­log­i­cal stress

And more good news: “Our find­ings showed that guid­ing a group of chil­dren through one minute of a slow-paced breath­ing exer­cise in an every­day set­ting can, in the moment, sig­nif­i­cant­ly low­er the aver­age lev­el of phys­i­o­log­i­cal arousal” — Jele­na Obradovic at the Stan­ford Grad­u­ate School of Education

#3. APA: With dig­i­tal men­tal health going main­stream, will/ should psy­chol­o­gists be able to “pre­scribe” interventions?

“The asso­ci­a­tion is also work­ing with stake­hold­ers to address the fact that, at present, FDA-approved products—even those with a psy­chol­o­gy basis—need to be pre­scribed but that most psy­chol­o­gists lack this author­i­ty. To help fix this prob­lem, APA and oth­ers “are work­ing to devel­op a more inno­v­a­tive reg­u­la­to­ry mod­el that fits these soft­wares bet­ter and doesn’t use the word ‘pre­scrip­tion,’” said Vaile Wright, PhD, APA’s senior direc­tor of health care inno­va­tion. To aid in this effort, in Sep­tem­ber 2021, the FDA des­ig­nat­ed APA an “expert part­ner orga­ni­za­tion,” which will allow the asso­ci­a­tion to pro­vide exper­tise on behav­ioral change tech­nol­o­gy and methodology.”

#4. Dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tics pio­neer Akili Inter­ac­tive plans to go pub­lic in mid-2022 at a $1B valuation

“By har­ness­ing advances in cog­ni­tive neu­ro­science and con­sumer tech­nol­o­gy, Akili is chang­ing the neu­ropsy­chi­atric treat­ment par­a­digm. Akili’s patent­ed and clin­i­cal­ly val­i­dat­ed tech­nol­o­gy plat­form rep­re­sents a new cat­e­go­ry of soft­ware-based med­i­cine: advanced and pro­pri­etary dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tics that are designed to direct­ly tar­get neur­al phys­i­ol­o­gy to bet­ter serve the needs of patients and their families.”

Great com­pa­ny and team, very promis­ing approach…and quite tough con­text in the mar­kets (com­pa­ra­ble com­pa­ny Pear Ther­a­peu­tics went pub­lic in Decem­ber at $10/ share; closed Jan­u­ary 28th at $3.89/ share). The Times They Are a‑Changin’

#5. Are ADHD med­ica­tions over­pre­scribed or under­pre­scribed? (Quick answer: both)

Longer answer: “The main take­away from this study is that a only a minor­i­ty of chil­dren and teens with ADHD receive med­ica­tion treat­ment for the con­di­tion. And, rel­a­tive­ly few youth who don’t meet ADHD diag­nos­tic cri­te­ria are receiv­ing ADHD med­ica­tion. While rec­og­niz­ing that the actu­al num­bers pre­sent­ed are only esti­mates, it is there­fore rea­son­able to con­clude that under-treat­ment is sub­stan­tial­ly more com­mon than over-treatment.”

#6. Lyra Health, Big Health and Mantra Health raise a com­bined $332M to com­mer­cial­ize dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tics for mental/ behav­ioral health

Hope­ful­ly this will lead into much high­er fund­ing for RCTs to explore the short-term and long-term Pros and Cons of a range of promis­ing interventions.

#7. Head­space Health acquires AI-dri­ven dig­i­tal men­tal health start-up Sayana

“Sayana per­son­al­izes users’ expe­ri­ences based on their check-ins and mood trends, sur­fac­ing high-qual­i­ty con­tent and self-care exer­cis­es root­ed in cog­ni­tive behav­ioral ther­a­py (CBT), accep­tance com­mit­ment ther­a­py (ACT) and dialec­ti­cal behav­ioral ther­a­py (DBT), as well as breath­ing exer­cis­es” … “We’ve got­ten to the point now where con­tent rec­om­men­da­tions via AI are high­er qual­i­ty by engage­ment rate than rec­om­men­da­tions from providers them­selves. The AI rec­om­men­da­tions for con­tent are used more fre­quent­ly,” [Rus­sell Glass, CEO, Head­space Health] said.

#8. On schools, men­tal health, dig­i­tal sur­veil­lance, stu­dent pri­va­cy and parental input

“In the past year, school dis­tricts in Cal­i­for­nia and else­where have con­tract­ed with dig­i­tal sur­veil­lance com­pa­nies to spy on stu­dents at school and home, cit­ing the need for men­tal health sup­port dur­ing the pandemic.
Despite being a vig­i­lant and involved par­ent, I found out only recent­ly that my own kids, who attend high school in the Coro­na-Nor­co Uni­fied School Dis­trict, have been under con­stant dig­i­tal sur­veil­lance for the past year.”

This is not a wise way to intro­duce new tech­nolo­gies, much less those aimed at improv­ing men­tal health (of stu­dents, of par­ents, of staff). Your take?

 

Last but not least, as promised, a cou­ple fun brain teasers to test your men­tal self-rota­tion. What is men­tal self-rotation?

It is the cog­ni­tive skill to imag­ine your­self in dif­fer­ent loca­tions in space and to imag­ine your­self mov­ing accord­ing­ly. We need that skill in every­day activ­i­ties such as read­ing a map or find­ing our car in the park­ing lot. Enjoy!

#9. Test your con­cen­tra­tion and men­tal self-rota­tion skills with this quick brainteaser

#10. Men­tal rota­tion exer­cise to chal­lenge your brain’s pari­etal lobe

 

Wish­ing you and yours a healthy February,

 

The Sharp­Brains Team

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, SharpBrains Monthly eNewsletter, Technology & Innovation Tagged With: ADHD-medication, Akili Interactive, APA, Big Health, Breathing, Cognitive Neuroscience, cognitive problems, consumer technology, digital therapeutics, Headspace Health, health care innovation, Lyra Health, Mantra Health, neuropsychiatric treatment, older-Americans, physiological stress, psychologists, Sayana, sharpbrains, smartbrains

Great interview on bilingualism, sports, education and neuroplasticity — en español

November 2, 2021 by SharpBrains

(trans­la­tion avail­able below)

Álvaro Fer­nán­dez Ibáñez: “La edu­cación bil­ingüe ayu­da a retrasar prob­le­mas cog­ni­tivos como el alzhéimer” (El Mundo):

PREGUNTA. ¿A qué se ded­i­can los neu­ro­con­sul­tores? ¿Qué relación tienen con la educación?

RESPUESTA. En los últi­mos años ha empeza­do a aumen­tar el interés por mejo­rar la capaci­dad del cere­bro. Al igual que las per­sonas quieren estar en bue­na for­ma físi­ca, se pre­ocu­pan tam­bién por estar en bue­na for­ma cog­ni­ti­va. Se habla cada vez más de con­sul­tores del cere­bro o entre­nadores men­tales y hay más actua­ciones basadas en la neu­ro­plas­ti­ci­dad. Esto se puede aplicar para ayu­dar a que los alum­nos apren­dan más. Por ejem­p­lo, la escuela Arrow­smith de Canadá tiene un pro­gra­ma de refuer­zo cog­ni­ti­vo para alum­nos con necesi­dades espe­ciales. Tam­bién está cre­cien­do mucho el mind­ful­ness para reducir el estrés de niños y pro­fe­sores. [Read more…] about Great inter­view on bilin­gual­ism, sports, edu­ca­tion and neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty — en español

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Education & Lifelong Learning Tagged With: Alzheimer, Arrowsmith, brain-development, cognitive effort, cognitive problems, cognitive-reserve, educación bilingüe, esfuerzo cognitivo, español, mindfulness, problemas cognitivos, reserva cognitiva, Spanish

Six guidelines to navigate the Aduhelm controversy and (hopefully) help patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment and early-stage Alzheimer’s Disease

October 13, 2021 by Kaiser Health News

The approval of a con­tro­ver­sial new drug for Alzheimer’s dis­ease, Aduhelm, is shin­ing a spot­light on mild cog­ni­tive impair­ment — prob­lems with mem­o­ry, atten­tion, lan­guage or oth­er cog­ni­tive tasks that exceed changes expect­ed with nor­mal aging.

After ini­tial­ly indi­cat­ing that Aduhelm could be pre­scribed to any­one with demen­tia, the Food and Drug Admin­is­tra­tion now spec­i­fies that the pre­scrip­tion drug be giv­en to indi­vid­u­als with mild cog­ni­tive impair­ment or ear­ly-stage Alzheimer’s, the groups in which the med­ica­tion was studied.

Yet this nar­row­er rec­om­men­da­tion rais­es ques­tions. What does a diag­no­sis of mild cog­ni­tive impair­ment mean? Is Aduhelm appro­pri­ate for all peo­ple with mild cog­ni­tive impair­ment, or only some? And who should decide which patients qual­i­fy for treat­ment: demen­tia spe­cial­ists or pri­ma­ry care physi­cians? [Read more…] about Six guide­lines to nav­i­gate the Aduhelm con­tro­ver­sy and (hope­ful­ly) help patients with Mild Cog­ni­tive Impair­ment and ear­ly-stage Alzheimer’s Disease

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health Tagged With: Aduhelm, Alzheimer’s Disease, attention-problems, brain bleeding, brain swelling, cognitive problems, dementia, dementia specialists, early-stage Alzheimer’s, Food and Drug Administration, language problems, memory problems, mild-cognitive-impairment, neuropsychological, neuropsychological-tests, normal cognition, primary care physicians, tests

Update: Understanding Brain Health via Cosmological Health, and vice versa

December 29, 2020 by SharpBrains

LEFT: SECTION OF CEREBELLUM, WITH MAGNIFICATION FACTOR 40X, OBTAINED WITH ELECTRON MICROSCOPY (DR. E. ZUNARELLI, UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL OF MODENA); RIGHT: SECTION OF A COSMOLOGICAL SIMULATION, WITH AN EXTENSION OF 300 MILLION LIGHT-YEARS ON EACH SIDE (VAZZA ET AL. 2019 A&A). CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF BOLOGNA

Wel­come to a new edi­tion of Sharp­Brains’ e‑newsletter, fea­tur­ing fas­ci­nat­ing find­ings, books and resources for life­long brain health.

#1. “The human brain (sec­tion; left image above) func­tions thanks to its wide neu­ronal net­work that is deemed to con­tain approx­i­mate­ly 69 bil­lion neu­rons. On the oth­er hand, the observ­able uni­verse (sec­tion sim­u­la­tion; right image) can count upon a cos­mic web of at least 100 bil­lion galax­ies. With­in both sys­tems, only 30% of their mass­es are com­posed of galax­ies and neu­rons. With­in both sys­tems, galax­ies and neu­rons arrange them­selves in long fil­a­ments or nodes between the fil­a­ments. Final­ly, with­in both sys­tems, 70% of the dis­tri­b­u­tion of mass or ener­gy is com­posed of com­po­nents play­ing an appar­ent­ly pas­sive role: water in the brain and dark ener­gy in the observ­able Uni­verse.” Under­stand­ing Brain Health via Cos­mo­log­i­cal Health, and vice versa

#2. One very smart and gen­er­ous brain to bright­en your day: Indi­an teacher Ran­jitsinh Disale wins annu­al $1M Glob­al Teacher Prize; shares half with 9 finalists

#3. “Of all the qual­i­ties par­ents can cul­ti­vate in their chil­dren, hope and opti­mism are the most pre­cious. We can nur­ture hope and opti­mism in our kids by demon­strat­ing that we always have some con­trol over our envi­ron­ment and our­selves. The future isn’t a tide that’s going to crush us, it’s a wave we’re a part of.” — Made­line Levine, author of Ready or Not. Three favorite 2020 books on par­ent­ing and men­tal health

#4. A superb mem­oir on becom­ing a psy­chother­a­py pio­neer and best­selling writer: Becom­ing Myself, by Irvin D. Yalom

#5. This sur­vey of 2500 fam­i­lies about what ADHD treat­ments seem to work/ not work finds that 49% of par­ents report Exer­cise to be ‘Extreme­ly or Very Effec­tive;’ above any oth­er treatment.

#6. On the dan­gers of “pro­duc­tiz­ing” lifestyle guide­lines that help build brain reserve and delay cog­ni­tive prob­lems; Buy­er beware: The sto­ry of a pricey and “cre­den­tialled” pro­gram to end Alzheimer’s Disease

#7. Now, giv­en that “In a new McK­in­sey report, 62% of employ­ees con­sid­er men­tal health issues a top chal­lenge,” it is good to see grow­ing resources and approach­es aimed at address­ing the chal­lenge: Calm rais­es $75 mil­lion, expands into cor­po­rate men­tal health and wellness

#8. And, step by step, dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tics are going main­stream: Click Ther­a­peu­tics rais­es $30 mil­lion in debt to advance com­mer­cial­iza­tion of smok­ing ces­sa­tion app Clickotine

#9. Nev­er two with­out three: Pear Ther­a­peu­tics rais­es $80M; finds cost sav­ings of $2,150 per patient with opi­oid use disorder

#10. Final­ly, we asked our team and trust­ed advi­sors to com­pile a list of ideas to stay sane and healthy in the months ahead, pri­or­i­tiz­ing habits shown to pro­mote brain health, resilience and pos­i­tive neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty: Enjoy these 3 New Year Res­o­lu­tions and 36 Ideas for a Hap­pi­er & Health­i­er 2021

Wish­ing you a safe, healthy and hap­py New Year

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, SharpBrains Monthly eNewsletter, Technology & Innovation Tagged With: adhd, ADHD-Treatment, Books, brain, brain health, brain-reserve, Calm, Click Therapeutics, cognitive, cognitive problems, digital therapeutics, mental health, Neurons, neuroplasticity, Pear Therapeutics, Psychotherapy, resilience, treatments

Trend: Growing research on the relationship between sleep and Alzheimer’s Disease

August 15, 2018 by SharpBrains

___

The brain may clean out Alzheimer’s plaques dur­ing sleep (Sci­ence­News):

“Bendlin’s stud­ies are part of a mod­est but grow­ing body of research sug­gest­ing that a sleep-deprived brain might be more vul­ner­a­ble to Alzheimer’s dis­ease. In ani­mal stud­ies, lev­els of plaque-form­ing A‑beta plum­met dur­ing sleep. Oth­er research sug­gests that a snooz­ing brain runs the “clean cycle” to remove the day’s meta­bol­ic debris — notably A‑beta — an action that might pro­tect against the dis­ease [Read more…] about Trend: Grow­ing research on the rela­tion­ship between sleep and Alzheimer’s Disease

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health Tagged With: Alzheimer’s Disease, cognitive problems, cognitive-decline, dementia, sleep, sleep apnea, sleep disorders, sleep parameters, sleep problems

Fact: Multiple factors can contribute to memory problems…and “getting older” is often not the main one

March 17, 2016 by SharpBrains

Memory_problems_doctorWhen Mem­o­ry Changes Are More Than ‘Just Get­ting Old­er’ (US News):

“You’ve prob­a­bly heard this phrase before: “I’m just get­ting older”…The expla­na­tion should be used with cau­tion, though. Often, I tell my patients not to blame some­thing they are expe­ri­enc­ing on “just get­ting old­er,” because they might miss some­thing that could be treat­able [Read more…] about Fact: Mul­ti­ple fac­tors can con­tribute to mem­o­ry problems…and “get­ting old­er” is often not the main one

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Education & Lifelong Learning Tagged With: brain, cognitive problems, delirium, depression, medical conditions, medication, memory, memory complaints, older, stroke, thyroid problems

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