{"id":70,"date":"2021-05-20T07:09:58","date_gmt":"2021-05-20T07:09:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/?p=70"},"modified":"2021-05-20T07:32:50","modified_gmt":"2021-05-20T07:32:50","slug":"a-complex-link-between-body-mass-index-and-alzheimers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/2021\/05\/20\/a-complex-link-between-body-mass-index-and-alzheimers\/","title":{"rendered":"A complex link between body mass index and Alzheimer&#8217;s"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"release_date\">News Release\u00a0<time datetime=\"1621396800\">19-May-2021<\/time><\/div>\n<p class=\"summary\">Study finds combined genetic risk, lower BMI predict disease progression<\/p>\n<p class=\"meta_institute\">Ohio State University<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.eurekalert.org\/releaseguidelines\">Research News<\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"entry\">\n<p>COLUMBUS, Ohio &#8211; Though obesity in midlife is linked to an increased risk for Alzheimer&#8217;s disease, new research suggests that a high body mass index later in life doesn&#8217;t necessarily translate to greater chances of developing the brain disease.<\/p>\n<p>In the study, researchers compared data from two groups of people who had been diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment &#8211; half whose disease progressed to Alzheimer&#8217;s in 24 months and half whose condition did not worsen.<\/p>\n<p>The researchers zeroed in on two risk factors: body mass index (BMI) and a cluster of genetic variants associated with higher risk for Alzheimer&#8217;s disease.<\/p>\n<p>Their analysis showed that a higher genetic risk combined with a lower BMI was associated with a higher likelihood for progression to Alzheimer&#8217;s, and that the association was strongest in men.<\/p>\n<p>The finding does not suggest people should consider gaining weight in their later years as a preventive effort &#8211; instead, researchers speculate that lower BMI in these patients was likely a consequence of neurodegeneration, the progressive damage to the brain that is a hallmark of Alzheimer&#8217;s. Brain regions affected by Alzheimer&#8217;s are also involved in controlling eating behaviors and weight regulation.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We don&#8217;t want people to think they can eat everything they want because of this lower BMI association,&#8221; said senior study author Jasmeet Hayes, assistant professor of psychology at The Ohio State University.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We know that maintaining a healthy weight and having a healthy diet are extremely important to keeping inflammation and oxidative stress down &#8211; that&#8217;s a risk factor that is modifiable, and it&#8217;s something you can do to help improve your life and prevent neurodegenerative processes as much as possible,&#8221; she said. &#8220;If you start to notice rapid weight loss in an older individual, that could actually be a reflection of a potential neurodegenerative disease process.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The study was published online recently in the <em>Journals of Gerontology: Series A<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Previous research has found a link between obesity and negative cognitive outcomes, but in older adults closer to the age at which Alzheimer&#8217;s disease is diagnosed, the results have been mixed, Hayes said. And though a variant to the gene known as APOE4 is the strongest single genetic risk factor for Alzheimer&#8217;s, it explains only about 10 to 15% of overall risk, she said.<\/p>\n<p>Hayes has focused her research program on looking at multiple risk factors at the same time to see how they might interact to influence risk &#8211; and to identify health behaviors that may help reduce the risk.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;re trying to add more and more factors. That is my goal, to one day build a more precise and better model of the different combinations of risk factors,&#8221; said Hayes, also an investigator in Ohio State&#8217;s Chronic Brain Injury Initiative. &#8220;Genetic risk is important, but it really explains only a small part of Alzheimer&#8217;s disease, so we&#8217;re really interested in looking at other factors that we can control.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>For this study, the research team obtained data from the Alzheimer&#8217;s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, compiling a sample of 104 people for whom BMI and polygenic risk scores were available. Fifty-two individuals whose mild cognitive impairment (MCI) had progressed to Alzheimer&#8217;s in 24 months were matched against demographically similar people whose MCI diagnosis did not change over two years. Their average age was 73.<\/p>\n<p>Statistical analysis showed that individuals with mild cognitive impairment who had both a lower BMI and higher genetic risk for Alzheimer&#8217;s were more likely to progress to Alzheimer&#8217;s disease within 24 months compared to people with a higher BMI.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We think there&#8217;s interaction between the genetics and lower BMI, and having both of these risk factors causes more degeneration in certain brain regions to increase the likelihood of developing Alzheimer&#8217;s disease,&#8221; said Jena Moody, a graduate student in psychology at Ohio State and first author of the paper.<\/p>\n<p>The effect of the BMI-genetic risk interaction was significant even after taking into account the presence of beta-amyloid and tau proteins in the patients&#8217; cerebrospinal fluid &#8211; the core biomarkers of Alzheimer&#8217;s disease.<\/p>\n<p>The relationship between low BMI and high genetic risk and progression to Alzheimer&#8217;s was stronger in males than in females, but a larger sample size and additional biological data would be needed to expand on that finding, the researchers said.<\/p>\n<p>Because brain changes can begin long before cognitive symptoms surface, a better understanding of the multiple risk factors for Alzheimer&#8217;s could open the door to better prevention options, Moody said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If you can identify people at higher risk before symptoms manifest, you could implement interventions and prevention techniques to either slow or prevent that progression from happening altogether,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>To date, scientists have suggested preventive steps include maintaining a healthy weight and diet and participating in activities that reduce inflammation and promote neurofunctioning, such as exercise and mentally stimulating activities.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;re finding again and again how important inflammation is in the process,&#8221; Hayes said. &#8220;Especially in midlife, trying to keep that inflammation down is such an important aspect of maintaining a healthy lifestyle and preventing accelerated aging.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p align=\"center\">###<\/p>\n<p>This work was supported by the National Institute on Aging and Ohio State&#8217;s Chronic Brain Injury Initiative.<\/p>\n<p>Additional co-authors include Kate Valerio, Alexander Hasselbach, Sarah Prieto and Scott Hayes of Ohio State and Mark Logue of Boston University and the VA Boston Healthcare System.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Contacts: <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Jasmeet Hayes, <a href=\"mailto:Hayes.1075@osu.edu\">Hayes.1075@osu.edu<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Jena Moody, <a href=\"mailto:moody.279@buckeyemail.osu.edu\">moody.279@buckeyemail.osu.edu<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Written by Emily Caldwell, <a href=\"mailto:Caldwell.151@osu.edu\">Caldwell.151@osu.edu<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>News Release\u00a019-May-2021 Study finds combined genetic risk, lower BMI predict disease progression Ohio State University Research News COLUMBUS, Ohio &#8211; Though obesity in midlife is linked to an increased risk for Alzheimer&#8217;s disease, new research suggests that a high body mass index later in life doesn&#8217;t necessarily translate to greater chances of developing the brain disease. In the study, researchers compared data from two groups of people who had been diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment &#8211; half whose disease progressed to Alzheimer&#8217;s in 24 months and half whose condition did not worsen. The researchers zeroed in on two risk factors: <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-body_weight_and_health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72,"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70\/revisions\/72"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bodyweight.com\/bw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}