From the Alvin and RosaLee Sarachek studio PBS Kansas presents Empowering Seniors Welcome to empowering Seniors.

I'm your host, Katherine Ambrose.

On this episode, we're talking about dementia as Dirty Dozen.

And help me with that is author doctor David Ajibade doctor David, thank you so much for being on our program.

Absolutely.

So honored to be here.

Thank you.

So I became familiar with you long distance because you live in Baltimore, Maryland, and, by way of Nigeria.

Yeah.

Tell us about dimensions Dirty Dozen and how you came up with that.

Great question.

I used to volunteer with the Alzheimer's Association.

I've been in Baltimore City now, as you said, for about five years.

And two years into it, I began to see some patterns.

I mean, we found out that Baltimore City is number one in the country for dementia.

Maryland is number one among the states.

And what I saw was that most people simply had no idea, about the risk factors that were out there.

They did not know Baltimore City had such great, such high risks.

Such high prevalence of this disease.

And so it just became my passion to really go out there and educate people, the rich and the poor, the young and the old on what they needed to know about dementia and about brain health in general, and how they can take control of their brain health.

Not was in a visit to the doctor, but in their day to day lives, because that is really what the battle against dementia is won or lost and what you do, what you don't do on a day to day basis.

And so what are those things to know about what you do or don't do on a daily basis?

Well, that's kind of like what why I came up with dementia is Dirty Dozen.

Because it's it's encompasses things like what you eat, obviously, how you move your body, your sleep, your interactions with your, with, friends, coworkers and so on.

And, the environment, what you, how you're exposed to the environment.

And so, easy example would be what happened during Covid 19, for instance, what happened during Covid 19 was, first of all, the primary problem was, of course, the infection by the virus.

But then the reaction by governments and people to the virus, the fear, the isolation, the inactivity.

By the way, those are two eyes in my dimensions.

Dirty dozen.

They all start with the letter I, by the way.

So I tried to make it a nice, cool framework and, all those different things kind of like all work together.

And in some cases, people actually came down with dementia after the pandemic.

There is various reasons for that.

So like I said, we wanted to highlight these things so people can see them in practical ways and do something about them.

Well, it's interesting that you mention Covid 19 that people out of fear unwittingly maybe caused other issues.

So you've got the infection with one of your eyes in isolation.

Yes.

why are those two of the eyes and the dirty dozen?

So that's all with infections.

Everything from, Covid 19 is a virus.

One of the things about what one of the things Covid 19 did as a virus was that it's damaged blood vessels.

And we all heard about some of some people had to have their limbs amputated, but more importantly, it's damaged parts.

In some cases, the smell centers in the brain.

What we now know about the smell centers in the brain up there, very close to the memory centers.

And so people who lost their sense of smell and had Covid, they had a much higher risk of developing dementia not too long afterwards.

Now, the isolation is another important thing we're finding out.

People are social creatures.

We've heard that over and over again.

We need that connection.

And so when we started getting isolated that that kind of shut things down.

And there studies have shown that when people are not interacting or they feel lonely or feel isolated, they they actually show physical shrinkage in parts of the brain.

That eye extremely important for human function.

So some people will think, oh well I'm not a people person.

Maybe that's with other people.

But you're saying all people were designed to be social creatures.

Yes.

And your brain kind of maybe goes on low power mode when you're isolated.

That's a good way to look at it.

Yeah.

Low power mode, so to speak.

Yeah.

Because the way our brains work and the way our brains, thrive is by just forming connections.

So as it is, without people, people are happier when they have great, long lasting, good relationships.

The same thing.

So it is within when the brain cells, when the neurons are actively connecting and reconnecting and detaching, that is when the brain is thriving.

But if you don't have that stimulation, that social stimulation, it kind of like you said, kind of shuts down to low power mode.

And if you did that continuous for a long period of time, especially be beyond extroverts.

Now introverts too is I'm an introvert.

Introverts.

It's also important to us still have that social connection.

And how?

I mean, you may not have as many friends and, social acquaintances as an extrovert, but you still need those social connections, those qualities, social connections.

So if you if you miss out on that, it will tell on your brain.

I always say to it, it almost doesn't matter if it's fun.

Ha ha.

Joyful friendships all the time.

They even just stress that maybe you experience from communicating with other people.

You can have dinner with people and you're like, oh brother, here we go again.

It's still good for your brain.

Yes, ma'am.

Absolutely.

And leaving the house and just dealing with the traffic and what's going on.

That's why it's important to interact with people.

Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely.

And that brings us into things like activity.

So one of the eyes is an activity right.

So whether it's mentally an activity of physical activity again the brain needs action.

It needs movements like we said it needs connection.

But that physical movement of the muscles going for a dinner for instance, or just going out, hanging out and just goofing off with friends and family, or even just going to the gym together with the partner.

All those things matter so much and that if you if the brain isn't getting them, it's it's just isn't going to work like it should.

But I want to tell you one probably that stands out more than everything else is has to do with what I think we call it insulin resistance.

And that has to do with your what you put in your body and how your body and your brain metabolize sugar and carbohydrates, especially those too.

Now we talk about carbs a lot.

We don't talk enough about proteins and and fatty acids and the good fats for the brain.

Those are so, so important.

And so, what we found out is that especially in, developed countries, there's a lot of food, obviously, and a lot of it is processed.

A lot of it is processed carbs, which means that you convert your food a lot directly into glucose, and that overloads the brain and body, causing what we call insulin resistance, meaning that the the cells are not reacting or responding to insulin and therefore not taking glucose in glucose begins to build up in the bloodstream.

And so those insulin, these are huge problems for the brain because the brain cannot tolerate that to high levels of insulin and to high levels of glucose.

I know these are getting a little technical, but it's so important that people understand too, that you you'll want to watch your diets and what you eat when you eat, how much you eat, and what you do after.

It is very important, which it's time to make when you eat.

When you eat, don't go to sit down in front of the television.

For instance, take a walk outside, especially outside if there's sun especially.

So that helps a lot, and that'll really make a difference in getting a sun.

Yes.

So I want to go back to activity that, it's almost counterintuitive, like working your body helps your brain.

People think crossword puzzles.

Yes, to exercise your brain.

But if you will exercise your body, which you very much need for success in aging.

Yes, but that also is helping your brain through.

Very true.

In fact, it could be argued that working your body and stressing your muscles may actually be a stronger longevity factor than just doing crossword puzzles and working.

I mean, I have patients who are extremely smart, people who are extremely successful, very mentally challenging lives, who still ended up with dementia.

So, yes, it's important to be mentally stimulated, but it seems as if the physical stressing now I want to I want to separate that from just aerobic exercise like walking and running.

Especially where ladies are concerned you need the the exertion and the stressing of the muscles.

Especially your leg muscles ladies.

And your of course your muscles and all that.

Because it seems to be that the muscles help to protect the body.

But the way you stress the body, the muscles produce chemicals that help to heal, repair the brain.

So the more you're stressing your muscles, the more you're helping your brain.

And a lot of seniors, a lot of Americans in general, can become very sedentary.

Yes.

And just sit too much.

Could be TV, could be computer, could be book work, but just sitting too much.

And that is that can be very deadly.

So you've probably heard sitting is the new smoking before.

That is an issue too, obviously, because it affects the blood vessels and it affects blood sugar levels and all that.

Some people obviously because of pain, maybe a knee problems, arthritis, they're not able to move like they should.

So we can understand that sometimes you might just need to focus on your arms or your legs or get something you can use to without weight bearing.

You can have some some people have these exercise little petals that they put by their chair when they're watching TV.

And to get the muscles moving.

Whatever you can do to stress your muscles would go a long way towards helping your brain.

And you know, some people might use 3 pound weight, but if you can do better than that, that's really important, because I think there's a lot of older Americans that think muscle building is not that important, or I can just use a little 1 pound or 2 pound or 3 pound weight.

But it really is important for people that are able to yeah, to they say lift heavy and really work on growing your muscles, which supports your bones.

Yes.

Which supports everything.

Yes.

Bones, brain and brain, heart everything.

And in fact, I when I say studying this, I mean, I'm not much of a muscle builder myself, but when I started learning about this, I was like, okay, I need to do things in my house that make it force me to build.

So, and you can start small, like you said.

But the amazing thing about the body is that it grows.

It adapts with time.

So the more load you place on it, the more load it can it can take.

So I put a pull up bar.

So my, my, my routine is before I go into the shower and I have a shower to at least twice a day, I'll go up and pull myself up about ten times or 15 times or for 15, reps.

And I'm, I'm about 200 pounds.

So that's a lot.

Initially I could barely do two.

Now I can do it.

I can go up as much as 15.

So it shows that the body will respond up to after a while and just you got to be consistent.

I think that's what it is very good.

And you were talking about insulin and that we can hang on to body fat.

I'm really challenging to get rid of.

And so all these things lead to inflammation.

Yes.

So tell us about inflammation because you didn't select it has one of your eyes.

And why is that.

It used to be.

That's a good point.

And thank you for catching that.

It used to be and I was at a point in time I was trying to build to get up to 12.

And then I found out I found two others that could fit in, and I had to cut the inflammation.

And the reason why why I cut inflammation is that inflammation is common to probably all the 12.

It is like the final, the final common pathway that's inflammation is what is how your body and your brain respond to injury.

So if there's a cut if there's a chemical attack, if there's an infection your body responds to that by mobilizing the immune cells and increasing blood flow.

So there's swelling.

There's there's, there's pain, there's increased blood flow, whatever it is.

So that's kind of like what happens.

So in the brain, as a result of all these things that we talk about and injuries, infections and so on, the brain produces inflammation.

So it's common to all of them.

And if you are going to address or prevent dementia, you've got to also address inflammation no matter what else you're doing because that's where there's counseling or treatment or whatever it is.

You've got to address inflammation.

What did you say.

The kind of like inflammation is the fire burning under the other 12 things that you've identified.

That is a good way to look at it.

Yes.

it used to be it seems to me that people were very afraid of cancer.

And cancer is very frightening.

I think people are even more afraid of losing their marbles, as they say.

Yeah.

And it's not just memory loss.

It's loss of cognitive ability.

Yes.

It's independence.

Especially men.

I mean, women too, but men have a greater fear of losing that that, that sense of independence, having to rely on independent somebody, again, a woman as well.

I think it's so important that people realize that, yes, dementia is a problem, but I think it's also more important that we realize that there's a lot that can be done about it.

We've known about Alzheimer's disease now for over, let's say 20, oh, 100 years or 100 years, right?

There has been so much advancements.

Now, it may not be obvious on the surface because everybody, you know, someone who has died from from dementia.

But we are beginning to see, especially among the functional medicine community, that there's a lot you can do about it, not just to prevent it, but also to some degree, to reverse it.

And so Alzheimer's is what people will think of, you know, those old timers, you know, Alzheimer's is like the big term because it's one that people really know.

But dementia is what dementia is.

The umbrella term Alzheimer's is just one kind of dementia, thereabouts.

Some people say as much as 30 different kinds of dementia, and you can divide those into reversible kinds, like caused by, depression.

Oh, is there's some other thing.

It's called there's a one called normal pressure hydrocephalus where there's a blockage in the drainage system in the brain.

Then there are the irreversible like Lewy body dementia, vascular dementia, and of course Alzheimer's dementia.

But like I said, in my experience, there are very, very few things that you can actually say, completely irreversible.

Okay, well, that's good to know.

So some of the ways that people could hedge their bets.

Yeah.

Against dementia, addressing infection, I would say has quickly as you can, like, take infection very seriously.

How can we prevent infection?

How can we treat ourselves quickly, getting rid of inflammation as much as possible.

What are some of the other things?

I think going back to what we talked about earlier, insulin resistance, that you have to reduce your sugar load as much as possible.

And one of the ways you can do that is by also increasing your intake of certain nutrients.

Now, the Alzheimer's Association, I talk about this all the time.

They did a study recently that showed that you can reduce your risk of dementia if you took vitamin D supplements can reduce the risk by as much as 40%, and for women is as much as 50%.

And one of the things a vitamin D does that it helps you, regulate sugar more, helps you to regulate your blood, your blood sugar, and your blood insulin levels.

It also addresses inflammation to some degree and, and other things like immune function and free radical damage.

So it's, it's one of the easiest things that you can do.

And there's a range and many sometimes doctors don't test for this, but I always insist on patients check in with their doctor and do not accept, all your blood pressure as normal or your your your vitamin D levels are normal.

Like, don't accept normal because normal isn't optimal.

It is not.

Okay.

If you hear my your vitamin D is normal.

What would you like to hear?

What kind of ranges would you like doctors to know about and patients to know about?

So the, the range is 30 to 100.

Most doctors are okay with you having 30 to 40.

I for my patients, as close as 80 is what I want is maybe closer to 100.

It really is one I would really feel comfortable.

I know that sounds a little extreme, but remember the range is 30 to 100, so the closer you are to 100, the in my opinion the better for you.

See, now I think this is like revolutionary news to some people because I hear 30 or 40, because I've interviewed so many doctors and I'm like, I don't want to be there, really want to see how close we can get up there.

And that can be shocking to many physicians as well.

Yeah.

That are traditionally trained.

You are traditionally trained in what?

field?

I started off as a radiation oncologist, just in training.

So I treat the cancers of every form and very advanced stages because in Nigeria, the third world country, they don't come up to you until it's really advanced.

So that was my field.

Was cancer.

Yeah.

And then why did you pivot to cellular optimization or functional medicine.

Kind of addressing the the fire that causes these things.

That question my interest has always been in optimizing human function.

I've always felt that the human body has more potential than we give it credit for.

So my interest is knowing how to improve human function, primarily brain function, now that I'm in this field.

So, functional medicine seemed like a good fit in that regard.

And I know you have some special concerns on special populations when it comes to dementia.

So tell us about that.

Well, I sometimes in my presentations I talk about the three three categories of people, veterans, blacks and women.

They have twice the risk of dementia as the rest of the population.

And I think it's it will be instructive for us to know why.

Because that would help us understand what to do for the general population as well.

So let's start with woman.

Woman.

One of the reasons why you have twice as high a risk as men, as you, as men do, is because during menopause that's perimenopause periods.

Everybody sometimes Aids is when you there's a drop in estrogen levels and, I'm on progesterone levels and some of the hormones as well, not estrogen has been found to be one of the greatest protectors of the brain.

And so that drop in insulin levels kind of removes the protection from the brain and leaves a wide open in some cases to further deterioration and damage.

And I believe that things like human or one replacement therapy can help.

Now, if you're over 70 and some.

And the advice is that you don't get started on those, but there are other things you can do to help, rebuild your hormone levels.

So and that's a probably another conversation for another time.

For blacks, one big thing is vitamin D. We just talked about it.

Vitamin D is a protect, a huge protector of the brain.

Like as juniors, we blacks have the lowest levels of vitamin D of any body in any race out there.

Unfortunately, we're not out in the sun like we should, especially during the winter and the on the fall.

So we need to step that up a little bit.

Another thing with black people is that we tend to have higher risks of cardiovascular disease and cardiovascular disease.

Other risk closes is a huge factor when it comes to dementia.

Okay.

So the heart and the brain connection.

So when people are having cardiac issues that impacts the brain.

Yes.

Tell us about veterans veterans and first responders.

Why are they at greater risk in the population.

The big thing that stands out as a toxin.

So that would be under insults in my book.

So I couldn't find a I couldn't find an eye that kind of like insults, like insults to the brain and body.

I like that, which are toxins and environmental exposures and exposures.

So think about some military people in the in the field exposed to gunpowder powder, the burn pits that burning up all kinds of chemical stuff.

They exposed also to the to trauma, brain injury, the trauma from losing their loved ones.

All of the the best friends in the field of battle.

So PTSD so that emotional stress.

So it's not just the physical stress but the emotional stress.

Those are and then of course, coming back home and not being able to adapt to the new world, the, the finally thrown back into after being in the field of battle for years and years and years.

So all those factors that make them less adapted to the real world and they tend many tend to be on drugs and alcohol just to, to dull, dull the pain to cope with the, with the, the challenges they are facing, first responders real quick obviously.

911 the World Trade Center, the, the firefighters, they went through a lot, exposure to all the toxins, even nuclear dust and all those things that happened during that time and the World Trade Center.

A lot of them have come down, as you probably know, with cancer and dementia.

So there's an toxins, a huge factor that I think we are understating when I'm giving enough emphasis to how hard should they work at getting rid of inflammation and working towards wellness?

I talking about people who are already kind of like the average person, or people who are already been exposed to this.

Let's talk about both.

Okay.

Yeah.

So I strongly recommend, that everybody have what I call everybody has a brain protection program or brain protection plan, which I work with my clients on, my patients on.

So you want to address four main factors sleep, nutrition, exercise or physical activity and mental health.

So let's start with nutrition.

Because the brain is made up of is a physical structure and it has physical health needs and it has raw materials that it requires.

So you've got to have the basic nutrients.

There are seven nutrients that I recommend as the most basic things for all of them.

Of of vitamins.

Three of them are minerals.

The minerals are zinc, potassium and magnesium.

Almost everybody's deficient in those three.

The vitamins, vitamin B, especially B1 and B12, vitamin C, vitamin D3 and vitamin K2.

I'm so glad you mentioned vitamin K. How do you how should people maybe look for that?

So the good thing is that you have the combination of D3 and K2.

And many, many stores now sell that and I get mine on Amazon.

So K2 specifically because that's a one and two K2 is what what K2 does is that it takes out calcium from the blood vessels and from the soft tissue, and then drives it into the bones.

So one of the main, issues people have, maybe health care professionals have with vitamin D3 is that it raises calcium levels.

And as you know, Katherine, if calcium levels are too high, you might have some deposits.

Deposits shown in blood, in soft tissue, in insides where it should not be inside even the arteries, the walls of the arteries themselves.

So what K2 does is it takes it out of that.

Like I said, and then drives it into the bones and teeth where it is needed.

And as a matter of fact, in places like Korea and Japan, the way they treat osteoporosis is by using high doses of K2, vitamin K2.

That is fascinating.

And, you know, a lot of us sometimes are given advice about avoiding the shine that the sun's not good for your eyes or sand's not good for your skin.

What are your thoughts on that?

Well, first of all, I say black people, you know, you don't have too much to worry about where that is concerned because we have by far the lowest rates of skin cancer.

And that's the main concern, especially where dermatologists are concerned.

One of the things that's, that is recommended is that you do want to be out in the sun, maybe control it, maybe, control the amount of time, 30 minutes to an hour or two and expose the parts of the of your body that are least exposed that at least have the lowest risk of, of cancer, for instance, like your torso, your your, your legs, your limbs, those on your arms, for instance, cancers are mainly around especially the skin cancers that are they're concerned about around the neck and the shoulders and all of that.

So we really we it's it's a balancing act.

So let's just put it that way.

You still need to get the sun.

But you also want to be concerned.

You also want to be careful about how much damage you expose your skin to.

So obviously you need proteins.

You need amino acids and all those and fatty acids and so on.

Those are all things that the brain must have to to function.

Now move on to sleep.

Most people, especially ladies, do not have adequate sleep.

And a recommendation is 7 to 8 hours.

Right?

Most people would last me off the stage, especially when I'm talking to the military people.

So what I say is maximize or optimize the sleep that you have.

And so there are certain nutrients that can help you sleep better.

Vitamin D is one of them.

Magnesium is one of them.

Melatonin is also one of them as well.

So so bottom line is optimize your sleep because it is a when sleep.

When you sleep properly, you have deep sleep.

That's when you have, repair brain repair, optimize brain repair and the removal of plaques and other toxins from the brain, which we all talk about.

Plaques.

Right.

Yeah.

And so you have to have that sleep so that the brain can cleanse itself.

Yes.

So after learning from you and other physicians like I monitor my sleep like it is my job.

And it's fascinating because you can count on your fingers how many hours you think you slept.

Yes.

But if you're using modern technology, it can be surprising.

Yes.

How much sleep you're getting and the quality of sleep that you're getting.

And I found that monitoring through modern technology has improved my behavior because I want to score well.

So.

So what do you do to improve your sleep.

You tell me I have an app.

So I wear a ring that monitors my sleep.

So what do I do.

I might be less likely to get on my phone in the middle of the night and scroll Facebook.

I practice good sleep hygiene where I'm going to bed at a good time, and I'm doing a wind down and I want it to be dark, except maybe for a nightlight.

I also recommend that people kind of put the sleep mask on as well, because I really blocks things out.

I sleep, but I always liberal sleep and I travel with it as well.

Okay, I'm going to go to sleep now.

All right.

That sounds good.

Doctor David, how can people find it?

Find your book.

It's on our website.

DrDavidAjibade.com it's on Amazon, I love your framework because it's so easy for people to gain insights.

There's another AI for you.

There you go.

Gain insight on dementias, dirty Dozen, and you make it so simple.

And this is things that people need to hear.

Because I think that a lot of us, have not heard about all of these things to this depth.

Yeah.

And once you know better, you do better, as they say.

And so it's really important.

And so I'm so glad to have you on our show, Empowering Seniors.

Thanks for traveling from Baltimore, Maryland to Kansas to be on our show.

Well, thank you so much for having me, Katherine.

I've enjoyed it.

And thank you for watching.

If you have questions about this topic or anything else that we cover, well you reach out to us.

You can email us at EmpoweringSeniors@kpts.org I'm Katherine Ambrose and I'll see you on the next Empowering Seniors