Exercises for the Brain

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Posted by Reyes | Posted on 14-09-2012

Category : Health, Just For Fun

Tags: ,

The brain – it is arguably our most important organ. While the heart may keep the blood flowing, the brain gives us control, personality, and so much more than we can even imagine. There have been previous posts on the Meals On Wheels San Diego blog about how to work out the body, and how working out the body is actually good for the brain, but the brain deserves a work out itself. Luckily for us, while not everyone likes the treadmill, biking or a little light weightlifting, brain exercises tend to be fun activities. Hopefully you can find an brain exercise that you can enjoy!

Read. Yes, reading is good for the soul – and the brain! Reading is an excellent exercise for your brain because it makes your brain multitask (without you realizing it). When you read you must see and interpret the letters into larger words, into what the words mean, and then connect them to larger ideas and overall narrative – really, your brain is putting a lot of things together for you. According to the Mayo Clinic reading helps decrease the chances of cognitive impairment. The good news is you don’t have to be reading Tolstoy or A Brief History of Time to give your brain a good work out – reading anything will do, from newspapers to Twilight!

Play More Games. What a wonderful piece of advice! Games can involve strategy, cooperation, concentration, and multitasking in a fun environment – you can exercise your brain in a way that isn’t stressful the way multitasking at work might be. “Games” is a broad word these days, but in this case, that is a good thing; board games, like the classic Monopoly, word games like Scrabble, and card games are all great “exercises” for the brain. While video games have to a certain degree replaced TV as the media menace that will “rot your brain,” video games have also recently been proven to enhance decision making, strategy, and creativity, so feel free to use video games as a brain exercise. Socializing during game play is good – but “gaming” can be a personal experience as well with games and puzzles like Sudoku, so don’t let the fact that no one else is in the house at the moment limit your game brain exercises!

Find Online Resources. You may have recently seen ads on TV for Lumosity, an online program that through activities like games will help you improve memory, attention, and overall function. Lumosity is far from the only program available when it comes to “brain exercise” as a quick Google search will tell you, BrainHQ is another popular service as well. Of course, with these services comes the ever important question – is it free? The answer is… sort of, most programs will let you play a limited number of games for free, but if you want to get further into the program you may have to shill out a few bucks. But, online resources is not limited to the just the brain training programs, searching the internet can bring you a plethora of teasers and puzzles (this list of fun, free, brain-healthy games for example). Sporcle is also a great site for fun quizzes and riddles on many, many topics – can you name all the U.S. presidents to date or the 200 most frequently mentioned characters from Harry Potter? Try it out!

Learn! Just because you are no longer a student doesn’t mean the world isn’t boundless in terms of things to learn and explore. “Learning” is obviously good for the brain – it is understanding, gaining and storing new information. Make a point to really “learn something new everyday.” Not sure where to start? Think of something that has always interested you but you might not know much about – I for one have always been interested in gardening but can’t say I know much about it, this is the perfect opportunity to pick up a book about say, roses, or even just do a quick Wikipedia search on the topic. Can’t think of anything you’d like to learn about off the top of your head? Click the “random article” button on Wikipedia, or look at something mundane in your life and just research away! A great interesting topic to research is food – look at what you ate for breakfast or dinner and Google “history of eggs” or “history of spaghetti” – what you find may surprise you!

Article by Nika Reyes

Poor sleep may negatively impact cognitive abilities

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Posted by Reyes | Posted on 07-09-2012

Category : Health, News and Information

Tags: , , , ,

Sleep – it’s become an important topic here at the Meals On Wheels San Diego blog, from advice on how to sleep to how sleep is the key to living a long life. This article from the NPR Health Blog conveys research that found an association between poor sleep and cognitive abilities. While only an association, this research has important implications of what we have been learning – healthy sleep is part of a healthy life! Included in this post are also more tips on how to sleep well!

Article originally published on Shots NPR’s Health Blog on August 27th, 2012. Find the original here.

Selected by Nika Reyes.

Sleepless Nights May Put The Aging Brain At Risk Of Dementia

As we age, our sleep patterns change. We’ve all heard the complaints: “I wake up in the middle of the night and can’t get back to sleep!”

Some sleep experts estimate that as many as 40 percent of older adults suffer sleeping problems such as sleep apnea and insomnia. Now, researchers have found a link between disrupted sleep and cognitive decline.

Psychiatrist Kristine Yaffe of the University of California, San Francisco, runs a memory disorders clinic and studies people who are at risk of developing dementia and cognitive impairment.

She says many of her older patients “either have difficulty falling asleep, waking up on and off throughout the night, or feeling tired in the day” and have to nap a lot.

Yaffe recently conducted a series of studies evaluating more than 1,300 adults older than 75, initially assessing their sleep patterns and, five years later, their cognitive abilities. She found that those with sleep-disordered breathing or sleep apnea had more than twice the odds of developing dementia years later.

Those who developed disruptions of their circadian rhythm were also at increased risk. So were those who awoke throughout the night, tossing and turning. The findings were presented at the annual conference of the Alzheimer’s Association.

It’s critical to note that Yaffe’s findings show only an “association” between sleep problems and dementia. Far more study is needed to confirm these findings and investigate possible reasons for this connection.

In the meantime, Yaffe says there is something of a silver lining. Older adults can be routinely screened for sleep problems. And, if diagnosed early, treatments can help them sleep better and possibly, down the line, reduce the risk of cognitive decline.

Psychologist Sonia Ancoli-Israel studies sleep and aging at the University of California, San Diego. Ancoli-Israel points to a variety of techniques to help people literally relearn how to go to sleep.

“We want to take a person who has negative associations with the bed — ‘Oh, my God, I know I’m not going to be able to sleep’ — and turn them around so that they look at the bed and they go ‘Ah, sleep,’ ” she says.

One of the most effective strategies is to actually restrict the amount of time people sleep, starting with very little time — say, five hours — and slowly adding 15-minute increments until the recommended eight hours is reached. It’s a slow process, says Ancoli-Israel, taking up to one month. But “it’s very, very effective and lasts for years,” she says.

Then, there’s “stimulus control,” in which, as she puts it, “you’re not allowed to do anything in bed but sleep — sleep and sex, that’s it.”

“You can’t pay bills in bed, you don’t take your computer or your iPhone or iPad to bed, you don’t watch TV in bed, you don’t read in bed.”

If you don’t fall asleep in 20 minutes, get out of bed and do something relaxing. “Don’t watch a suspenseful movie or read a suspenseful book,” she says. “Watch something a little more boring, read something a little more boring, so that when you get sleepy, you’re willing to set it down and go to bed.”

As for the clock, get rid of it. “The first thing you do when you wake up at night, you look at the clock,” Ancoli-Israel says. “And in order to look at the clock, you have to lift your head, open your eyes, but, more important, you have to take yourself from transitional sleep to full awakening to comprehend that its 1:10 in the morning and you want to be asleep.” Full awakening, of course, makes it difficult to get back to sleep.

If you need the alarm, cover the clock, she says, or put it under the bed. You’ll still hear it go off.

Now, there’s another sleep difficulty faced by older adults. Natural circadian rhythms change. Sleep is controlled in part by our core body temperature, which drops at night when we get sleepy and rises in the morning, and that’s when we wake up.

These patterns change throughout our lives. Teenagers’ body temperature drops late in the evening, so they don’t get tired till around midnight and don’t naturally wake up till late morning, causing many a parent to complain that their teen is sleeping the day away. In fact, they’re simply following their biological clock.

For older adults, it’s the opposite. Their body temperature drops really early in the evening, around 8 p.m., and rises really early in the morning, around 4 a.m. If your lifestyle allows it, Ancoli-Israel says it’s just fine to go to bed early and get up at 4 a.m.

But for many people, evening social events take precedence. In that case, Ancoli-Israel suggests light. “Light is the strongest cue our body has to know when to go to sleep and when to get up. Lots of light exposure during the day helps us have a strong biological clock,” she says.

And the best source of light is the sun. Ancoli-Israel says a late afternoon or early evening walk, when the sun is still out, is best. That delays the circadian rhythm and helps people stay alert later in the evening and sleep longer in the morning.

Long Distance Caregiving Part 3: Having A Great Visit

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Posted by Reyes | Posted on 30-08-2012

Category : Health, News and Information, Opinions and Editorials

Tags: , , , , ,

Visiting a loved one can be difficult – between kids, work or school, there’s always a commitment that needs to be taken care of and arranged before hopping in the car or getting on a plane. In this third and final installment on our long distance caregiving series, I will go over some ways to have an efficient and fun visit with a loved one that you provide long distance care for.

Plan, plan, plan ahead! Planning really cannot be emphasized enough when it comes to visiting someone that you are caring for. A visit is really an opportunity to do things that are much more difficult, if not impossible, to do from home – meet with doctors and other providers in person, do errands like grocery shop, and so on. Know what you want to accomplish before you visit – has mom not been explaining her dietary restrictions to you very well and you’d like to get the information straight from her doctor? Make the doctor’s appointment long before you get on the plane.

Socialize. This bit of advice is inspired by the Alzheimer’s Organization’s page about long distance caregiving, but I think it applies to more than just those who care for someone who has Alzheimer’s or dementia. Meet with your loved one’s friends and neighbors and any other relatives in the area and ask how things have been for your loved one at home. This doesn’t have to be some covert operation, but having this conversation with others may reveal things you might not otherwise know, and having a small network know that your loved one may need help with certain things, or may just need to occasionally be checked in on will help your loved one – and help ease your mind.

Take a look at medication and food. Is the food in the fridge still good? Is it healthy? Checking in on what your loved one is eating will give you a heads up on their condition and situation at home – perhaps more so than might be revealed in a phone conversation. While it is a common concern whether or not another person is taking their prescription medication correctly, actually being there and being able to see the medication is not an opportunity to be missed – make sure the medication is still good and that your loved one is using it correctly!

Assess needs and talk. Have you and your loved one been discussing a potential change on the phone – have you been considering hiring a maid service or something similar? Talk things out in person when you get the chance – it’s often easier to hash things out. Once you reach a decision and you want to do something like hire extra care, take the opportunity of visiting to interview potential services and help! You will feel more confident in the person helping your loved one if you were physically present in the hiring process.

Don’t forget to have fun. A visit is a chance to catch up on some business and logistics – maybe you and your loved one have a few doctors visits planned, need to catch up with the family lawyer, or have to go to Costco to buy some essentials – but it’s also a chance to just catch up. Let’s face it, calling mom and asking her about her day isn’t as fun as watching a movie, or making dinner with her. Remember to set aside time for the fun things. If your loved one has a difficult time leaving the house for any reason, this is your chance to take them to the movies or shopping – they will appreciate it more than you know!

Article by Nika Reyes

 

Long Distance Caregiving Part 2: Using technology to your advantage

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Posted by Reyes | Posted on 23-08-2012

Category : Health, News and Information

Tags: , ,

I have written previously about how Facebook and other social networking sites are a great way for seniors to stay connected and social. When it comes to long distance caregiving, today’s technology can be incredibly useful. While Facebook might be a great way to say hello and quickly catch up, for many caregivers tasks like planning medical appointments or reminding a loved one to take their medications are not always best executed through social media. Social media is a great tool – but it’s not the only one out there!

Electronic Tools for Long Distance Caregiving

Personal Health Records and Electronic Medical Records are great tools for managing healthcare needs and keeping track of prescriptions, conditions, doctor’s appointments and more. All important health information can be stored in one, easy-to-access, place, and can be easily shared with healthcare providers and other caretakers. The control over sharing is in the hands of the caretaker and their loved one, so privacy can still be maintained.

eCaring.com and similar sites allow caregivers and loved ones to easily work together. Loved ones and long distance caregivers have access to the easy to use eCaring software. Loved ones living at home are able to put in information about what they’ve eaten, whether they’ve taken their medication, and even what mood they’re in. Other eCaring users connected with this person can then check to make sure everything is all right at home – and eCaring itself creates reports on conditions for its users and can be used as an alert system reminding someone to take their medication or a similar task. This is a great system for consolidating all those little bits of information and having them all in one place.

BeClose is another online service but one that is in some ways more and less involved than eCaring. The BeClose system puts wireless monitors in your loved one’s home to track their movements and routines – so you know mom is watching TV or is in the kitchen. The person at home also wears a small alert button. BeClose will contact you immediately through a phone call, text, or email to alert you to any falls or physical accidents. Thus, BeClose has the advantages of not needing user input to the same degree as eCaring, but at the same time BeClose might not be as good at telling you things like whether medication was taken or breakfast was eaten. Used in conjuction, BeClose and eCaring would have many bases covered.

In conclusion, the above tools are meant to be examples of more specific long distance caregiving methods – tools to monitor health needs, daily needs, and physical activity – but there are many more out there and things like email, Skype and text messaging are not to be forgotten as great ways to easily interact from long distances. From my research, it seems like websites and software for long distance caregiving is a fast growing market, so surely more services will be created in the years to come. What I would like to caution against is privacy and choosing the right program. Programs like BeClose and eCaring could be seen as invasive for someone who lives alone and might not want someone – even their son or daughter – knowing when they’re in the bedroom or the kitchen (I could see BeClose becoming a touchy issue when it comes to the bathroom especially). Choosing a service like BeClose or eCaring is not something to be done without the input of a loved one – talk it over, conversation is key! Also, consider your loved one’s medical situation; eCaring, which needs the person at home to help update and inform, would not be the best choice for someone who easily forgets or has a condition that would make such a task difficult.

Additional source can be found here.

Article by Nika Reyes

How to get a great night’s sleep!

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Posted by Reyes | Posted on 17-08-2012

Category : Health, News and Information

Tags: , ,

I was inspired by Ray’s recent post about the importance of sleep in living a long, healthy, life. Personally, I’ve never been much of a night owl – early to bed, early to rise is more my style. Still, I’m a light sleeper, and any little thing wakes me up. I envy my friends who can miss phone calls and alarm clocks because they are so deeply asleep! Sleeping is an issue for many Americans at any age – we’re all familiar with the tropes of the drowsy teenager who wants to go to sleep at 3am and wake up at noon, or the sleep deprived middle-aged and older crowd, kept awake at night with worry and then fatigued during the day. The recent prevalence and popularity of energy drinks (and of course, good ole’ coffee) may indicate just how tired everyone is – so how can we start sleeping “healthy” and wake up in the morning feeling energized and ready to go?

The Problem

According to CDC, inadequate sleep is a growing problem in the United States. Disorders like insomnia as well as lifestyle traits – like work schedules and constant access to TV and cellphones – have made us a very sleepless nation. The official CDC recommendation for daily sleep for adults 18 years and over is 7 to 9 hours a night. We may think of lack of sleep as simply a nuisance in daily life, but inadequate sleep can have severe consequences. A lack of sleep frequently contributes to car accidents and the CDC also states, “persons experiencing sleep insufficiency are also more likely to suffer from chronic diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, depression, and obesity, as well as from cancer, increased mortality, and reduced quality of life and productivity.” Thus, sleep is clearly important in keeping anyone happy and healthy.

How to Sleep Well

Have a regular bedtime and waking hour: We may think of ‘bedtimes’ as something for children but consistency is key when it comes to healthy sleeping habits. Setting a time to go to bed and a time to wake up can make your body like ‘clockwork,’ similar to the way you probably get hungry at same time of day that you usually have meals. And as tempting as it may be don’t oversleep even if you didn’t sleep well or get to bed at the right time the night before – it can throw off your sleep cycle.

No naps!: I’ve heard this piece of advice many times before and I always find it rather sobering because I absolutely love a nap, but the truth is a nap during the day will make it harder to sleep at night. If you must nap, nap for only 10-20 minutes, 30 minutes at the most, because if you nap for any longer you will go into deep sleep, and instead of waking up energized and refreshed you will wake groggy and grumpy. Anecdotally, I find if I “nap” for an hour or sometimes even more, I wake up grumpier and more tired than I was before. Instead of napping late in the day to feel energized, try moving around or getting a good dose of sunlight – in San Diego we should have plenty of that!

Exercise – but not too much: Light exercise helps promote healthy sleep – if your body is physically tired, your mind will be too – but be wary, an intense exercise in the few hours before bedtime may actually make it harder to sleep. If you want to push yourself when working out, try and do it earlier in the day.

Keep a pencil and paper nearby: This advice pertains to anyone who might lie in bed at night thinking about the chores and errands they have to do tomorrow or worrying about projects and work. Keep something to write on next to the bed and simply write down any worry that comes to mind – you will know you wrote it down and won’t forget, so you will be free to let the thought slip away from your mind.

Avoid caffeine and alcohol: The caffeine should be a no brainer – as tempting at that espresso might be after dinner, avoiding it will definitely help you sleep. Alcohol is a depressant and while it may initially help you sleep, alcohol will often wake you up throughout the night because it irritates the body and makes more bathroom trips necessary!

Still can’t sleep? If you still have a hard time sleeping, relax and keep trying. If sleep doesn’t come, read a book for twenty minutes or so, and then try again. Avoid getting out of bed or watching TV – noise and light make it harder for most to sleep. Keep trying and get into that regular sleep pattern!

Article by Nika Reyes

Sources:

http://www.cdc.gov/features/dssleep/

http://www.k-state.edu/counseling/topics/life/sleep.html

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