Brain Training Evaluation Checklist

There seems to be a zillion brain training programs. Some famous one have commercials and are pretty well known for their online training, e.g. Lumosity. Some provide toys/games that you can buy and try in a store, e.g. Marbles, the Brain Store. Many are apps of all shapes and sizes.

So how do you know which program  to buy, use or believe?

Luckily, the smart folks at SharpBrains have this good advice for picking and choosing you can read their advice below or whack this URL into the browser of your choice: http://sharpbrains.com/resources/10-question-evaluation-checklist/

“Questions to Evaluate Brain Fitness Programs and a brief explanation of why each question is important:

1. Are there scientists, ideally neuropsychologists, and a scientific advisory board behind the program?

Neuropsychologists specialize in measuring and understanding human cognition and brain structure and function.

2. Are there published, peer-reviewed scientific papers in PubMed written by those scientists? How many?

PubMed is a service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine that includes millions of citations science journals. If a scientist has not published a paper that appears in that data­base, he or she cannot make scientific claims.

3. What are the specific benefits claimed for using this program? What specific cognitive skill is the pro­gram training?

Some programs present the benefits in such a nebulous way that it is impossible to tell if they will have any results or not. “Brain training” itself is a limited benefit, because activities like gardening or learning a new language provide “brain training” too…you need to see something more specific, like what cognitive or emotional skill that program is aimed at enhancing.

4. Does the pro­gram tell me what cognitive or emotional skill I am exercising, and is there an independent assessment to measure my progress?

The ques­tion is whether the improvement experienced in the program will transfer into real life. For that to happen we need assessments that are distinct from the exercises themselves.

5. Is it a structured program with guidance on how many hours per week and days per week to use it?

Cognitive training, or brain training, is not a magic pill. You have to do the exercises in order to benefit, so you need clarity on the effort required.

6. Do the exercises vary and teach me something new?

The only way to exercise important parts of our brain is by tackling novel challenges.

7. Does the program challenge and motivate me, or does it feel like it would become easy once I learned it?

Good mental exercise requires increasing levels of difficulty.

8. Does the program fit my personal goals?

Each individual has different goals and needs when it comes to brain health. For exam­ple, some want to manage anxiety, others to improve short-term memory.

9. Does the program fit my lifestyle?

Some brain training programs have good short-term results but are very intense. Others may be better over time.

10. Am I ready and willing to do the program, or would it be too stressful?

Excess stress reduces, or may even inhibit, neurogenesis - the cre­ation of new neu­rons. So, it is important to make sure not to do things that stress us in unhealthy ways.”

They have lots of other great brain building info on their website - see http://sharpbrains.com/

How to hold off Alzheimer’s Disease 8+ Years

Ever walk into the kitchen and wonder why you walked into the kitchen? Did you started thinking, “Gee, is this the beginning of Alzheimer’s? Or, do you have a friend or relative that has Alzheimer’s and they no longer recognize their friends or relatives?

Maybe, you’re just a worrywart and don’t know what Alzheimer’s is, but it sounds terrible and you want to know how to avoid it?

First, according to the Alzheimer’s Association, “Alzheimer's is the most common form of dementia, a general term for memory loss and other intellectual abilities serious enough to interfere with daily life. Alzheimer's disease accounts for 60 to 80 percent of dementia cases.”

Scarred? If you’re not, you haven’t thought about this enough.

Here’s the good news, an article by Nicole Ostrow in Bloomberg reports that “People genetically prone to Alzheimer’s who went to college, worked in complex fields and stayed engaged intellectually held off the disease almost a decade longer than others, a study found.

Lifelong intellectual activities such as playing music or reading kept the mind fit as people aged and also delayed Alzheimer’s by years for those at risk of the disease who weren’t college educated or worked at challenging jobs, the researchers said in the study published today in JAMA Neurology.

More than 5 million Americans have Alzheimer’s disease, the most common form of dementia, and the number is expected to triple by 2050, according to the Alzheimer’s Association. Today’s findings show that intellectual enrichment pursued over a lifetime may help reduce the number of people who will develop the disease...”

My net takeaway? Keep doing Lumosity.

I originally read about this on the SharpBrains website: http://sharpbrains.com/blog/2014/06/25/mental-stimulation-over-genetics-how-to-hold-off-alzheimers-disease-8-years-even-apoe4-carriers/

They picked it up from Bloomberg: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-06-23/feeding-the-brain-s-curiousity-helps-delay-alzheimer-s.html

I haven’t found the JAMA Neurology article that they reference. If you find it, please send me a link to the abstract.

Copyright: <a href='http://www.123rf.com/profile_upixel123'>upixel123 / 123RF Stock Photo</a>

Does Lumosity Work? (Kesler of Stanford says “yes”)

For starters, you should probably know that Lumosity– www.lumosity.com - is “a San Francisco-based company that provides an online brain training program, where subscribers play nearly 40 different games to improve attention, flexibility, memory and problem solving. It launched in 2007 and has about 40 million subscribers.”

Let me see, if the US population is roughly 320 million people, which means something like 12 – 13 % of us is training our brains on Lumosity which seems incredibly high…and it doesn’t count all the other online brain exercise programs out there like Cogmed (http://www.cogmed.com/) and PositScience (http://www.positscience.com/ ).

Shelli Kelser is a assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and I read about her opinion in a nicely written DailyTech.com posting by Tiffany Kaiser: http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=31612. You should know that she, like me, is a Lumosity-addict.

Here’s the crux of Kaiser’s posting in response to the “Does it work?” question: “Shelli Kesler, assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University, seems to think it does.

Kesler recently led a Stanford study that aimed to measure how well Lumosity's brain training transferred into the real world. She used a small sample of 41 breast cancer patients who had been treated with chemotherapy. Past studies have shown that cancer patients who've undergone chemotherapy can experience cognitive impairment for years afterward.

The experimental group in the Stanford study played Lumosity games four times a week for 12 weeks, and results showed that they had improved word finding, executive function and processing speed over the control group.”

Using breast cancer victims as the experimental group strikes me as relevant for us brain tumor survivors. And, since I know several breast cancer chemotherapy survivors, I’m going to pass this on to them, too.

Trouble remembering? Do aerobics!

Forget where you put your keys? Your wallet? Your pants?[1] If so, you need to start aerobicizing. If you’re already aerobicizing, do more.

When I say “more”, I mean FASTERLONGERHARDER!!!

That’s because everything I read lately says that aerobic exercise helps create more brain cells and improve memory.

This “8 tips to keep your mind sharp” article by Alvaro Fernandez of SHARPBRAINS says that “Do aerobic exercise at least two hours per week. It has to be aerobic such as, jogging, running, or playing an intense sport. Exercising your body is very important, because it helps create new neurons.” - http://nbclatino.com/2013/06/20/8-tips-on-how-to-workout-your-brain/

 

The smartypants[2] at Lumosity recently posted this on their Facebook page: “Physical exercise can boost your cognition in a number of ways. When you exercise your body, blood flows to your brain, bringing extra cognition-boosting oxygen and energy. In addition, your hippocampus, a brain area critical for learning and memory, is highly active during physical exercise. Recent research even suggests that aerobic exercise may reverse hippocampal shrinkage, which occurs naturally with age.” See https://www.facebook.com/Lumosity?hc_location=timeline

 

Lastly, and perhaps most scientifically, an article posted on the U.S. National Institute of Health website entitled “The relationship between aerobic exercise and cognition: is movement medicinal?” states that “Aerobic exercise not only has been found to impact cardiovascular systems but has also shown benefits to brain function itself and specifically in the domain of memory and learning.”

So have I been aerobicizing? As a matter of fact, “yes.” Yesterday I biked for 2 – 3 hours. Today I swam a good half hour. And tomorrow I plan to embarrass myself in an aerobics class for an hour or so.[3]

Image credit: <a href='http://www.123rf.com/photo_12492263_vector-drawing-competition-on-run.html'>grynold / 123RF Stock Photo</a>

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[1] I did. Just don’t tell anybody.

[2] I say this in only the most positive way possible.

[3] I never do the right thing at the right time.