Potbelly, Midlife and Demetia Link
We’ve all heard how gaining weight around your middle isn’t good for your health — raises the chances for heart attack and stroke. So that’s old news.
What’s new is the link some researchers have found linking our flabby bellies in midlife to dementia later. I don’t know about you, but I find that very scary.
The study happened fairly recently, and went to print March 26th. The online version was available a little before that, but I just happened upon it today. Here’s the scoop in a nutshell:
If you fall into the obese category and your waist is greater than 40 inches, you are at a much greater risk of dementia. And this risk is independent of whether the individuals had diabetes (which carries its own dementia risk).
What can you do to lower your risk? Well, lose weight is obvious, but anything else? Check on your blood sugar, because even if you don’t have diabetes, Syndrome X can help pile on the pounds in your middle. Of course you can also just eliminate the "whites" (white bread, white rice, table sugar, etc.) from your diet.
As if we really need one more reason to lose weight — but dementia very likely means a nursing home or other custodial care. And if you don’t have the insurance or otherwise have money, that means your accommodations won’t be luxury, for sure.
Here’s a link to the original article, as well as the one the NY Times wrote up.
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