A preventative neurologist’s top 3 tips

The game has changed around brain health. Instead of waiting for memory problems and dementia to inevitably set in with age, we should be empowered to stop problems before they start.

What’s good for your heart is generally good for your brain. So if I had to pick three things everyone could do to reduce the risk of neurodegenerative problems later in life, they would be:

• Understand your blood pressure, and check it at home regularly.
• Get a lipid panel to understand your cholesterol profile and test your fasting glucose, HbA1c, and fasting insulin for a deeper look at your metabolic health, which directly connects to vascular health.
• Exercise is the biggest lever we can control. Aerobic exercise is critical for brain health as it boosts cerebral blood flow and supports communication between brain cells. The best fitness routine would involve both strength training and weekly high-intensity interval training sessions that hit 90% of your max heart rate.

Start paying attention as early as possible; your 30s are the perfect time to start understanding your baseline rather than waiting for symptoms to arise in your 60s.

And one really important note specifically for women: Emotional health is part of your brain health. While vascular health is important for both men’s and women’s brains, it’s been found that women’s brains are more strongly impacted by emotional health and social connection.

—Kellyann Niotis, M.D., Preventative Neurologist

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