Mind & Mood Archive

Dementia affects the person diagnosed but also raises fears for siblings and children. Here are the facts.

After a diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease, families face fears and difficult medical decisions.

Alzheimer's disease represents a personal health crisis, but it's also a family concern. What does it mean for your children or siblings if you are diagnosed with Alzheimer's? What does it mean for you if a close relative develops the condition?

Ask the doctor

Q. I find myself getting more and more anxious, but I don't like to take medications. Is there an alternative natural treatment I can try instead?

A. Anxiety is an incredibly common problem. Although there are many FDA-approved medications that have been widely studied and proved effective, studies show that up to 43% of patients with anxiety use alternative medicine to treat it. Among alternative therapies, herbal treatments are widely used both for therapeutic purposes and for comfort.

Learning a new dance step involves exercise, socialization, and a challenge, all of which can help boost thinking skills.
Image: iStock

Challenging your brain, staying physically active, and being socially engaged may help keep our thinking skills sharp.

Image: Thinkstock

Plan now to help prevent overeating, trips to the hospital, and depression.

The winter holidays are supposed to be a joyous time, filled with celebration. But they come with health risks, such as loneliness and depression, overeating, weight gain, falls in icy weather, foodborne illness, and heart problems. Here are ways to protect yourself while enjoying the season.

Medical science is making good progress in unraveling the biological underpinnings of depression. Someday, these discoveries may lead to lab tests that can help identify or confirm depression and other mood disorders.

Right now, doctors and therapists rely on the symptoms reported by their patients, along with clinical expertise and experience, to diagnose depression and determine a course of treatment.

Sometimes, though, additional information can help distinguish depression from other problems. That's why your doctor might recommend any of the following tests:

Two common classes of drugs have been linked to dementia. Fortunately, there are alternatives to both.

If you're worried about developing dementia, you've probably memorized the list of things you should do to minimize your risk—eating a healthy diet, exercising regularly, getting adequate sleep, and keeping your mind and soul engaged. In addition, some of the drugs you may be taking to help you accomplish those things could increase your risk of dementia. In two separate large population studies, both benzodiazepines (a category that includes medications for anxiety and sleeping pills) and anticholinergics (a group that encompasses medications for allergies and colds, depression, high blood pressure, and incontinence) were associated with an increased risk of dementia in people who used them for longer than a few months. In both cases, the effect increased with the dose of the drug and the duration of use.

These findings didn't come entirely as a surprise to doctors who treat older people. The Beer's List published by the American Geriatrics Society has long recognized benzodiazepines, antihistamines, and tricyclic antidepressants as potentially inappropriate for older adults, given their side effects. Such drugs are on the list because they share troubling side effects—confusion, clouded thinking, and memory lapses—that can lead to falls, fractures, and auto accidents.

A recent study in The Journal of the American Medical Association found that seniors got no mental boost from taking daily omega-3 fatty acid supplements and antioxidant vitamins for four years. On the other hand, that doesn't mean eating a nutritious diet throughout life doesn't promote healthy aging.

The clinical trial involved more than 3,500 people, average age 73. Researchers were primarily testing the ability of daily nutritional supplements to prevent vision loss from age-related macular degeneration (AMD), which damages the light-sensing retina in the back of the eye. Participants also had tests of their mental function every other year in addition to annual eye exams.

Sometimes pain has a purpose — it can alert us that we've sprained an ankle, for example. But for many people, pain can linger for weeks or even months, causing needless suffering and interfering with quality of life.

If your pain has overstayed its welcome, you should know that you have more treatment options today than ever before. Here, we've listed eight techniques to control and reduce your pain that don't require an invasive procedure — or even taking a pill.

If you suffer from anxiety, the constant, nagging feelings of worry can be troubling and hard to control. These feelings are usually intense and out of proportion to the actual troubles and dangers in your everyday life. They can make it hard to function at home, at work, or in social situations.

Anxiety can be treated with medication, but several mind-body approaches may also be effective.

Some intriguing research suggests that positive psychology can help you weather the routine ups and downs of life and also build resilience for times of greater difficulty.

Here are three ways to capture the benefits of positive psychology.