Mental Activities More Helpful Than Vitamin Tablets in Preserving Mental Abilities

Mental training and solving puzzles on a daily basis helps improve and preserve mental abilities at old age, suggests a study.

Keeping the brain active is the best way to preserve mental ability, suggests a recent study by researchers at the University of Toronto.

As a person grows older, fear of memory loss and decline of mental health slowly creeps in. Dementia, which is deterioration in memory, thinking, behavior and ability to perform everyday activities due to damage in brain tissues, mainly affects older people though it is not a normal ageing process.

Playing Online Puzzles Could Help Prevent Alzheimer's Disease
Playing crosswords and word search could help the brain stay active and thereby reduce the risk of getting Alzheimer's disease, say scientists.

Degradation of cognitive ability makes a person dependent on others and has a physical, social, financial and emotional impact on the person and their families.

Scientists are still exploring the causes and trying to understand the physiology of dementia, which affects 35.6 million people worldwide.

As there are no current treatment strategies to completely cure problems leading to deterioration of mental health, many scientists have focused their research in finding ways to prevent degradation of mental functions.

Dementia
There are over 24 million people with dementia and its incidence is on the rise. Prevention through lifestyle changes is the sensible way to a dementia-free life.

Many factors from sleep, physical and mental activities, vitamin supplements to smoking and diet have been linked to mental health in various studies.

In an attempt to identify the best method to cut down the risk of dementia, Dr Raza Naqvi from University of Toronto and his team reviewed 32 trials involving about 25,000 healthy patients aged 65 or older.

Literacy and Education May Prevent Dementia
Dementia is characterized by loss of global cognitive ability beyond normal aging in previously unimpaired individual. It affects activities like memory, speech understanding, etc.

Studies evaluating the effect of physical activity on mental health reported very low benefits of exercise.

While drugs, hormone therapy, vitamins and supplements showed no significant benefits in retaining the memory at old age.

Healthy Lifestyle may Help Stave Off Dementia
Good diet and exercise may not only protect against heart disease and stroke, but also helps keep Alzheimer's disease at bay, says research.

Three studies that had looked at mental training had reported significant benefits of mental activities on mental health. Mental activities assessed in the trials included daily tasks like finding a phone number, attending memory-training programs and solving puzzles like Sudoku and crossword.

The authors opine that more studies are required to analyze the impact of mental training in preventing the deterioration of mental abilities at old age.

Source-Medindia