Kim and I love to laugh about aging. We’ve made tons of videos about how we unapologetically use our cell phone light to read menus and have to turn the radio down to concentrate. We’ve decided we aren’t going to try to stay hip and “with it” (do people say “with it” anymore) because we are getting older, and getting older is great. But as we have aged, we sometimes feel a big fat cloud of uncertainty hanging over us. And it’s not something we typically talk about with all of you. Cancer and heart disease plague people in Kim’s family. For me, it is dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease.
In my family, it’s pretty scary statistics. 3 of my 4 grandparents had either Alzheimer’s or dementia at the end of their lives. My Dad passed away two years ago and had severe dementia, and my mom is at the end stage of Alzheimer’s. For my grandparents, their condition was well shrouded by their children, I didn’t know much about it until the final year or so. But for my parents, this has been going on for over a decade. There have been impossibly difficult conversations with them where my brother and I have had to play the parent, and use tough love to get them into a safe place. It meant restricting their freedom, taking them away from their home of almost 50 years, and in some cases, taking them away from each other.
Trying To Find Answers
Reading this you may be thinking: “Penn, it’s not your fault. Your parents should have prepared for this and kept you from having to make these decisions.” Here’s the thing… They did. They wrote thorough advance directives, including instructions of how to care for them if they lost their faculties. My Dad told me and my brother at least a dozen times, things like “Son, I start losing my mind, I want you to take me to an island with a fishing pole, and drop me off.” Bottom line, he was trying to spare me the pain that he went through as a son. In the end, none of that mattered.
However, I have something my parents didn’t have: A ton of new information and evidence about ways to at least TRY to prevent this terrible disease. This week on our podcast, Kim and I talk with a rockstar in the world of preventive neurology, Dr. Richard Isaacson. He’s one of the leading voices in the fight against Alzheimer’s disease prevention, and he has dedicated his career to not just treating memory loss, but working to stop it before it starts.
Could Ozempic Help Alzheimer’s?
According to Dr. Isaacson, up to 45% of Alzheimer’s cases may be preventable through lifestyle and medical interventions. He believes that early action in your 30s and 40s is critical. Emerging GLP-1 weight loss drugs like Ozempic might also help reduce Alzheimer’s risk by addressing insulin resistance, weight, and inflammation. “”GLP-1s, I believe, are going to be an absolutely critical part of the story,” explained Dr. Isaacson. “Lifestyle plus drugs are the way that certain people need to follow to get themselves off the road to Alzheimer’s.”
Most importantly, Dr. Isaacson believes that your genes and family history doesn’t guarantee you will get the disease. In blood tests, the APOE-ε4 gene is a known risk factor but that risk can be lowered through intervention. He believes lifestyle choices and personalized prevention plans can help “win the tug-of-war against your genes.” We cover so much in this episode about supplements and research that Dr. Isaacson has invited me to be a part of. In the coming months, I plan to release a special episode all about what I have learned in my testing with him.
Enjoy the show (including the Top 5 Funniest Things About Alzheimer’s… yes, you know we had to) and tell me what questions you have as I go on this journey.
