Aging
22 Oct Exercise Improves Brain Blood Flow Up To About Age 70
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Professor Emrah Düzel
Director, Institute of Cognitive Neurology and Dementia Research, OvG Univ. Magdeburg, Germany
Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience
University College London
Medical Research: What are the main findings of the study?
Professor Düzel: We found that even in old age, intensive and long-term (3 months) aerobic exercise can improve blood flow in the hippocampus, a brain structure that is of critical importance for memory. The increase in blood flow is evident during a resting state and this means that the exercise improves the overall perfusion of the hippocampus. Such effects had previously only been reported in young adults. As previously observed in young adults, the change in blood flow after exercise is related to the improvement of specific memory skills. We found the closest relationship between improved blood flow and recognition memory for complex objects. This is interesting because this type of memory is likely to benefit from “pattern separation”, a process that in animal studies of exercise is tightly associated with hippocampal neurogenesis.
However, we also found that the exercise-related improvement in hippocampal blood flow and in recognition memory was absent in the older seniors of our study cohort. Those who were beyond 70 did not show any improvement. We reasoned that this may have been due to higher levels of stress in the older seniors. Therefore, we investigated whether elevated serum cortisol levels dampened the benefits of exercise in the older seniors. But this was not the case making it unlikely that stress levels can account for these findings.
13 Oct Insomnia Symptoms May Not Reflect Objective Sleep Measurements
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jen-Hao Chen, Ph.D. Assistant Professor, Department of Health Sciences University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65211 Medical Research: What are the main findings of the study? Dr. Chen: In this study, we mapped four commonly-reported insomnia symptoms (feeling rested when waking up, having trouble falling asleep, waking up during the night, waking up too early and not being able to fall asleep again) to direct assessment of sleep characteristics in the general population of U.S. older adults. While we know older adults frequently complain about their sleep, we know little about how these complain reflect older adults’ actual sleep outcomes. Using innovative actigraphy data of 727 older adults aged 62-91 from the National Social Life, Health and Aging Project, we found that two of these four common report of insomnia symptoms did not match specific objective sleep characteristics as these questions intends to index. The question of feeling rested was not related to any objective sleep characteristic. The question of difficulty falling asleep was not related to the objective measure of time to fall sleep but was related to other objective sleep characteristics. For waking up during the night question, high frequency was associated with more wake time after sleep onset and numbers of wake bout (but was also related to other objective sleep characteristics). For waking up too earlier question, answer of this question was related to earlier wake up time. But again, other objective sleep characteristics also predicted frequency of waking up earlier. In sum, many of the relationships and non-relationships found in this study were unexpected. Findings suggested that these widely used questions did not related to older adults’ sleep outcomes as exactly as the wording suggested. Thus, while older adults’ report of these questions are related to objective sleep characteristics in some ways, insomnia symptoms and objective sleep characteristics did not complete match each other as expected.30 Sep Swimming Associated With Fewer Falls In Older Men
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Associate Professor Dafna Merom Ph.D
Physical Activity and Health
University of Western Sydney
Penrith NSW Australia
Medical Research: What are the main findings of the study?
Dr. Merom: In a cohort of 1667 older Australian men (mean age 76.8 years) data on incident falls were collected every four months by telephone interview. We compared the rate of falling over 48 months of follow-up of men who participated in golf, Calisthenics, lawn balls, aerobic machines and swimming. We found that only swimming was associated with 33% reduction in falls occurrence. We also found that swimmers performed better on balance tests in our baseline measurements. In particular on the postural stability test and for those whose leisure activity was only swimming, apart from walking and other lifestyle activities.
20 Sep Better Fitness May Delay Increased Blood Pressure Due To Aging
Xuemei Sui, MD, MPH, PhD
Assistant Professor, Department of Exercise Science
Division of Health Aspects of Physical Activity
Arnold School of Public Health
University of South Carolina
Columbia, SC 29208
Medical Research: What are the main findings of the study?
Dr. Sui:
First, blood pressure is inversely associated with cardiorespiratory fitness levels among men. People in higher fitness categories had lower blood pressure than those in lower fitness categories.
Second, fitness is a strong effect modifier for the systolic blood pressure aging trajectory.
A higher fitness level can significantly delay the natural age-associated increase in blood pressure.
11 Sep Poor Appetite in Elderly Increases Mortality Risk
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Professor Mark L. Wahlqvist, M.D., Ph.D.
Institute of Population Health Sciences, National Health Research Institutes, Taiwan
National Defense Medical Center, School of Public Health, Taiwan
Monash Asia Institute, Monash University Melbourne, Australia
Medical Research: What are the main findings of the study?
Prof. Wahlqvist: Poor appetite and dietary quality as judged by diversity separately (each by about 50%) and together (by about 80%) increase the mortality risk in older persons living in the community.
08 Sep US Life Expectancy Varies By Sex, Race/Ethnicity and Geography
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Benedict Truman Associate Director for Science CDC’s National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention Medical Research: What are the main findings of the study? Dr. Truman: In 2008, healthy life expectancy, which isthe number of years a person is expected to live in good or better health after a particular age, varied by sex, race/ethnicity and geographical regions in the United States. In each of four U.S. census regions, females were expected to live longer and healthier lives than males; non-Hispanic whites were expected to live shorter but healthier lives than Hispanics; and non-Hispanic whites were expected to live longer and healthier lives than non-Hispanic blacks.28 Aug Shorter Telomeres Associated With Risk of Coronary Heart Disease
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Philip Haycock, PhD Post-Doctoral Research Assistant MRC Integrative Epidemiology Unit University of Bristol Bristol, BS8 2BN, UK Medical Research: What are the main findings of the study? Dr. Haycock: We found that shorter telomeres were significantly associated with risk of coronary heart disease and that the association was independent of conventional vascular risk factors, including age, sex, body mass index, smoking, history of diabetes, blood pressure and lipid markers.26 Aug Rare APOB Gene Variant Linked to Exceptional Longevity
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Dr. Manuel Serrano PhD
Tumour Suppression Group
CNIO, Melchor Fernandez Almagro 3, 28029 Madrid, Spain.
Medical Research: What are the main findings of the study?
Dr. Serrano: We investigated the contribution of rare genetic variation to human exceptional longevity (EL, individuals with ≥100 years of age) by exome-sequencing long-lived siblings in three different families where exceptional longevity clustered. We found only one gene that harbored rare variants that was likely to contribute to human longevity across all three families and this gene was the Apolipoprotein B gene (APOB). We further found that the frequency of these rare APOB variants associated with familial exceptional longevity was greater in a cohort of 206 nonfamilial cases of exceptional longevity compared to the control population, though this association did not reach statistical significance. In addition, we found rare variants in many genes within individual families that are likely to contribute to human longevity given previous studies in animals.
03 Jul Poor Sleep Linked To Faster Brain Aging
MedicalResearch.com: Interview with:
Dr. June Chi-Yan Lo
Research Fellow
Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory
Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School
Singapore
MedicalResearch: What are the main findings of the study?
Dr. Lo: The Duke-NUS study examined the data of 66 older Chinese adults, from the
Singapore-Longitudinal Aging Brain Study. Participants underwent
structural MRI brain scans measuring brain volume and neuropsychological
assessments testing cognitive function every two years. Additionally,
their sleep duration was recorded through a questionnaire. Those who slept
fewer hours showed evidence of faster brain aging and decline in cognitive
performance.
12 May Resveratrol Levels In Older Adults Found To Be Unrelated to Lifespan
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Richard D. Semba, MD MPH
W. Richard Green Professor of Ophthalmology
The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
Baltimore, MD 21287
MedicalResearch: What are the main findings of the study?
Dr. Semba: Resveratrol levels in older adults are not related to the risk of heart disease or cancer and are not related with lifespan. These findings were made in the InCHIANTI Study, a rigorously conducted study of human aging that is sponsored by the National Institute on Aging.
30 Mar Breast Cancer Survivors: Increased Marker of Aging Accompanies Standard Chemotherapy
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Hanna Sanoff MD, MPH
Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center
Department of Medicine
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings of the study?
Dr. Sanoff: We measured p16, a protein that increases with cellular aging, in blood cells of women receiving chemotherapy for breast cancer. We found that a standard course of chemotherapy led to an increase in p16 expression equivalent to what we have previous seen in people over the course of 10-15 years of chronological aging. This increase persisted in cancer survivors an average of three and half years after treatment.
21 Jan Most Advanced Age Adults are Women, Many Living in Community
MedicalResearch.com Interview with
Paula A. Rochon MD, MPH, FRCPC
Vice President, Research, Women's College Hospital
Senior Scientist, Women's College Research Institute
Professor, Department of Medicine
University of Toronto, Ontario Canada
MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings of the study?
Dr. Rochon: Our main findings are that there are now more than 1800 centenarians in Ontario. Among those over 100 years of age, 60 per cent are 101 years of age or older. In addition, most centenarians are women (85 per cent), and this percentage increases to 90 per cent among those who are 105 years of age and older.
21 Jan Life Enjoyment Predicts Less Physical Decline with Age
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Professor Andrew Steptoe, MA, DPhil, DSc, FMedSci
Director, Institute of Epidemiology and Health Care
University College London
British Heart Foundation Professor of Psychology
Department of Epidemiology and Public Health
London WC1E 6BT
MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings of the study?
Dr. Steptoe: We are trying to understand whether positive well-being has beneficial effects as far as health and physical function is concerned. The main findings are that the risk of developing impairments in activities of daily living (things life being able to bath or shower without help) over the next few years among older people is lower in people who enjoy life more. In addition, enjoyment of life predicted less decrease in walking speed over our 8 year study period in this sample of older men and women. Of course, these associations could be due to many things: the people with greater enjoyment of life could be more affluent, have less physical illness or disability to start with, or have healthier lifestyles at the outset, and these factors could predict the changes in physical function over time. But what we found is that baseline health, economic circumstances, and lifestyle explain only part of the association between enjoyment of life and deterioration in function. So the research suggests that enjoyment of life contributes to healthier and more active old age.
05 Nov Prostate Cancer: Statins after Diagnosis Decreased Mortality
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Dr. Laurent Azoulay
Project Leader, Lady Davis Institute
Assistant Professor, Department of Oncology, McGill University
MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings of the study?
Dr. Azoulay: Using large population-based databases from the UK, we assembled a cohort of men newly-diagnosed with non-metastatic prostate cancer. Within this group of men, the use of statins after prostate cancer diagnosis was associated with a 24% decreased risk in cancer-related mortality. We observed duration- as well as a dose-response relationships. Furthermore, in a secondary analysis, we observed that the benefits were greater among men who used also used statins before their diagnosis, with more modest yet significant benefits among men who initiated the treatment after their diagnosis. The latter result is one of the novelties of this study, as it provides an estimate of the potential benefits of statins, if used in the adjuvant setting.
11 Oct Episodic Memory Impairments and Tip-of-Tongue Experiences
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Prof. Timothy Salthouse
Brown-Forman Professor of Psychology
Department of Psychology
University of Virginia
Charlottesville, VA 22904-4400
MedicalResearch.com: What prompted this work?
Prof. Salthouse: I think it is noteworthy that the research originated as an undergraduate project by Arielle Mandell. Ms. Mandell was supported by a University of Virginia Harrison Undergraduate Research Award while she was doing the research, and a report of the research served as her Distinguished Major Thesis.
The research was prompted by the observation that according to self-reports, tip-of-the-tongue experiences occur more and more frequently with increased age, and often seem to be associated with concerns about memory decline and possibly impending dementia. We wondered
- 1) whether these self-reports are valid, and
- 2) if they are valid, do they truly indicate age-related failures of the type of memory used in the diagnosis of dementia.