As you get older and find yourself misplacing your glasses, forgetting the phone number of a good friend or experiencing a hazy recall of what you did the past weekend, you get those pangs of sudden panic. Is it normal forgetfulness or a sign of something more?

Fortunately, these signs of short-term memory loss are a part of the normal aging process and shouldn’t raise flags that your mind is in deterioration mode. Your brain is one of the most complex and powerful organs in your body and has the ability to grow new brain cells in the hippocampus (the area of the brain responsible for the forming, sorting and storing memories) each day throughout your lifetime.

There are many factors other than the normal aging process that contribute to short-term memory loss, however. Below are seven common and sometimes overlooked causes of short-term memory loss followed by 10 tips to protect your brain and even help induce the growth of new brain cells.

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A very exciting article was just published this week in the prestigious journal The Lancet–Neurology. The title of the article is Neurobehavioral effects of developmental toxicity. The authors are the world-famous researchers Philippe Granjean,M.D., and Philip Landrigan, M.D., from the Harvard School of Public Health

These two authors published a highly regarded article in 2006 about the developmental neurotoxicity of industrial chemicals. In that article, the authors noted that “A few industrial chemicals (e.g. lead, methylmercury, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), arsenic and toluene are recognized causes of neurodevelopmental disorders and subclinical brain dysfunction.”

This new article is an update on that original article by the same authors. In the new article, the authors point out that since 2006 epidemiologic studies have shown six additional developmental neurotoxicants. The article goes into great detail about the findings.

The authors importantly they point out that “Untested chemicals should not be presumed to be safe to brain development”.

This information is extremely important, because currently disorders of neurobehavioral development affect 10 to 15% of all births. In addition, the rates of autism spectrum disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder are increasing worldwide.


The authors quickly point out that the root causes of this global pandemic of neurodevelopmental disorders is not completely understood. Certainly we know that genetic factors play a part, but genetics alone cannot explain the recent increases in prevalence that we are seeing in these disorders. The authors estimate the genetic factors account for no more than 30 to 40% of all cases of neurodevelopmental disorders that we see.

This quickly leads to the conclusion that environmental exposures are part of the causation and that in some cases these environmental exposures do interact with genetic predispositions.

The authors state that “Strong evidence exists that industrial chemicals widely disseminated in the environment are important contributors to what we have called the global silent pandemic of neurodevelopmental toxicity. The developing human brain is uniquely vulnerable to toxic chemical exposures and major windows of developmental vulnerability occur in utero and during infancy and in early childhood. During these sensitive lifestages, chemicals can cause permanent brain injury at low levels of exposure that would have little or no adverse effect in the adult.”

In my practice of medicine, I increasingly see women of childbearing age with enormous amounts of lead and mercury in their body. There is an epidemic of subclinical mercury toxicity in young people from the enormous amount of fish that they consume.

In this article, the authors state that neurological “deficits at seven years of age that were linked to low-level prenatal exposures to methylmercury were still detectable at the age of 14 years.”

The authors also point out that “functional MRI scans of people expose prenatally to excess amounts of methylmercury showed abnormally expanded activation of brain regions in response to sensory stimulation and motor tasks.

The photo below is from that study with photo in group A from 3 adolescents with increased methylmercury exposure compared to Group B of the control group.

In addition, the authors point out that phthalates, that are found in personal care products that young women use regularly, are also linked to behaviors that resemble components of autism spectrum disorder, and ADHD.

Most importantly this is why I continue to talk to my young patients about detoxification of the future mother from all the heavy metals, phthalates, and the pesticides as much as we can before she conceives. There is no blood brain barrier in the brain of the developing fetus. All the mother’s chemicals that are in her body are dumped into the fetus during pregnancy.

Because reduction in IQ points are directly related to early exposure to these chemicals, people will have much healthier and smarter babies if the mother’s body burden of chemicals, is minimized before she conceives, and she avoids further exposure during her pregnancy.

In this article, the authors talk about the financial consequences of lost IQ points due to toxicity, and the resulting effect on the gross domestic product of the nation.

The chart below from the articles shows the number of IQ points lost due to certain exposures.

Because of this correlation between loss of cognitive skills caused by environmental toxins and a subsequent reduction in a child’s academic and economic attainments, calculations can be made about the financial costs involved. In the United States, the annual cost of methylmercury toxicity is estimated at roughly $5 billion. In the European Union, methylmercury exposure is estimated to cause a loss of about 600,000 IQ points every year, corresponding to an annual economic loss of close to €10 billion.

I urge all women of childbearing age to asks their doctors, including their gynecologists, to simply get a blood lead and mercury level on them. Your levels of these two metals should be zero when you conceive.

In my practice as an environmental doctor, I am able to go further and also measure a woman’s phthalate levels and pesticide levels, along with challenged urine tests that give us an idea of the mother’s total body load of heavy metals. These can easily be cleaned out before she conceives.

This is why I feel that Preconception Pregnancy Planning is so essential for women who want to have a new baby.I urge you to consider this for yourself and your loved ones. And that is why I do it with my young female patients.

The author of the article, Dr Grandjean, says it very well-
“We have the methods in place to test industrial chemicals for harmful effects on children’s brain development—now is the time to make that testing mandatory.”

I urge you to read this article and come to your own conclusions.

More Reference Articles on this post

Dr Grandjean’s New Book Only One Chance: How Environmental Pollution Impairs Brain Development

Growing Number of Chemicals Linked with Brain Disorders in Children

The article in Lancet-Neurology just published this week

Developmental neurotoxicity of industrial chemicals.- The 2006 article

Children’s vulnerability to toxic chemicals: a challenge and opportunity to strengthen health and environmental policy

Environmental Working Group. Body burden—the pollution in newborns. Washington, DC: Environmental Working Group, 2005

Inherited effects of low-dose exposure to methylmercury in neural stem cells

Low-level environmental lead exposure and children’s intellectual function: an international pooled analysis

Decreased brain volume in adults with childhood lead exposure

Fish consumption, methylmercury and child neurodevelopment

Genetic predisposition to cognitive deficit at age 8 years associated with prenatal methylmercury exposure.

Prenatal exposure to organophosphate pesticides and IQ in 7-year old children.

**All Pictures, except the opening picture, in this blog post are from the Original Article in the Lancet

Most people love the warmth and coziness of having a fireplace in their home, so much so that fireplace sales rose well over 50 percent since 1998, according to the Hearth, Patio and Barbecue Association.

Over half of all U.S. homes (55 percent) now have at least one fireplace, and they’re ranked as the third most desirable feature that people look for when buying a new home, says the National Association of Home Builders (outdoor porches and upscale kitchens rank first and second).

But as you crank up your fireplace to stay cozy in this cold winter season, it’s important to know that fireplaces can be dangerous — accounting for a large number of home fires and emergency room visits every year. You can enjoy your fireplace while keeping your family and your home safe by avoiding these 10 common fireplace dangers.

Click here to find out the 10 common dangers.

 Heart disease, the leading cause of death in the United States, takes the lives of about 2,500 Americans each day. This killer disease is so prevalent that it’s responsible for 40 percent of all U.S. deaths, killing more people than all forms of cancer combined, according to the Mayo Clinic.

It can take on many forms ranging from coronary artery disease, the most common type, which involves a hardening of the arteries that provide oxygen and nutrients to your heart, to heart failure, heart muscle disease, heart valve failure and abnormal heart rhythms or arrythmias.

While heart disease is often serious, the good news is that you may have more control over your heart disease risk than not. In fact, while a family history or advancing age are known risk factors that you can’t control, there are multiple heart disease risk factors that are completely within your power to influence. These include:

• Not smoking
• Keeping your cholesterol levels in a healthy range
• Managing high blood pressure
• Exercising regularly
• Maintaining a healthy body weight
• Controlling diabetes, if you have it
• Lowering C-reactive protein levels
• Controlling stress and anger

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According to a new study in the prestigious Journal of Clinical Oncology a few months of yoga could help fatigue and inflammation, in women who have survived breast cancer.

One of the study researchers Janice Kiecolt-Glaser, M.D. particularly pointed out that the benefits derived from yoga in this group of women were significantly different compared to a group that had only done aerobic exercise.

She is quoted as saying “We were really surprised by the data because some more recent studies on exercise have suggested that exercise interventions may not necessarily lower inflammation unless people are substantially overweight or have metabolic problems.” However she went on to say “In this group, the women didn’t lose weight but we saw really marked reductions in inflammation. So this was a particularly striking finding biologically.”

The data from the study was particularly impressive. At the end of three months of yoga, participants who were in the yoga group, reported a 41% decrease in fatigue a 12% increase in vitality. In addition, the yoga group had lower levels of inflammatory molecules in the blood compared to the non-yoga group.

Excitingly, the researchers continued to follow the patients for an additional three months, after the intervention with yoga had ended. They found that the beneficial effects of the three months of yoga did not wear off in the yoga group compared with the control group.

This is a most exciting finding, and certainly if you have friends with breast cancer, please encourage them to do yoga.

Original Journal Article

Other popular articles about these findings are

Here and

Here

Please leave me your comments and thoughts about all this new information !

In regards to Transgenerational Epigenetic Inheritance (TEI),that I discussed in the previous article, it has recently been learned that a traumatic event can affect the DNA in sperm and alter the brains and behavior of subsequent generations.

One of the researchers of this effect is Dr. Brian Dias. He is quoted as saying that “There is absolutely no doubt that what happens to the sperm and egg will affect subsequent generations.”

Furthermore another one of the researchers, Prof. Markus Pendry M.D. from University College London, has stated that these findings are “highly relevant to phobias, anxiety and posttraumatic stress disorders”. He said that the studies show “compelling evidence” that a form of memory can be passed between generations. He is further quoted to say “It is high time public health researchers took human transgenerational responses seriously. I suspect we will not understand the rise in neuropsychiatric disorders or obesity, diabetes and metabolic disruptions generally without taking a multigenerational approach.”

This is just another reason that young people, of childbearing age, should take especially good care of themselves, their diet and their lifestyle.

Please click here to read about how this study was done.

And you can read the original article in Nature Neuroscience by clicking here.

And yet another article here.

Here is a further article about epigenetic effects of diet on healthy aging.

The new science of epigenetics is coming to the forefront and is finally appearing in the lay literature.The word “Epi” means above. Therefore “epigenetics” means “above the gene.”

What this basically means is that our genes are not written in stone. A gene’s expression can be changed based on the foods we eat, the lifestyle we live, and even our emotional state.

Most recently it is being recognized that the food your grandparents ate affects your genes. Similarly, the food that we eat affects our offspring’s genetics. This new science is called “Transgenerational Epigenetic Inheritance” (TEI).This is simply a big expression that means that the things we do to our genes by our diet, our lifestyle and our mental state are transmitted to our children and their children, and further.

How Far Can This Go?

I recently was at a medical convention about the newest epigenetic research. It is known that when a mouse is exposed to certain pesticides, its genes change. It has now been discovered, that this changed gene is passed down all the way through the fifth generation of its offspring. The scientists did not go beyond measuring the fifth generation.

I encourage you to read this article, if you are interested in the subject.

If You Care about Your Health, You Need to Know about the Emerging Science of Epigenetics

For a striking number of Americans, bullying has moved beyond the walls of the schoolyard to the top rungs of the corporate ladder. Although concrete numbers are scarce, it’s estimated that one in six workers is a victim of workplace bullying — more than the number of those affected by sexual harassment or racial discrimination. And worldwide, bullying in the workplace has reached epidemic levels in some countries, according to the International Labor Organization.

Although anyone can become a victim, in the United States 80 percent of the time the person being bullied is a woman, according to an online survey by The Workplace Bullying & Trauma Institute (WBTI).

Contrary to what many believe, those who are bullied at work are not vulnerable, weak or thin-skinned. Instead, people who are targeted are usually the ones that others perceive as tough competition: go-getters, those who do well at their jobs, are personable, well-liked and competent.

As for the bullies, “It’s about control. It’s what all bullies want: control,” says Gary Namie, Ph.D., founder of the Campaign Against Workplace Bullying. “Despite the mask of bravado, they are tiny, insecure people.”

Click here to read more.

 

The 21st Century Problem in Schools: Bullying, and How to Keep Your Kid From Being a Victim

Children bullying other children has been an issue since there were children, and though it has often been downplayed as “part of growing up,” it has always had potentially serious implications from an emotional perspective.

But these days, due to a host of factors such as our society’s glorification of celebrity and being popular, violence in mass media, and easy access to deadly weapons, the implications can be especially risky. At the extreme, in many of the school shootings over the last decade, the perpetrators were withdrawn students who had a history of being bullied. Though still largely ignored or discounted as a minor issue, bullying is a very serious – and growing – problem.

According to a new study of two schools by UCLA researchers, 47 percent of sixth graders in one school and 46 percent in the other said they’d been bullied at least once during a five-day period.

Bullying can take on many forms-name calling, teasing, spreading rumors, physical aggression-and the end result can be tragic, both for the victim and the bully. After being teased, even if it’s “just joking around,” kids are seriously affected, and verbal abuse happens twice as often as physical abuse, according to the UCLA study that was published in the March/April issue of the journal Child Development.

Click here to  read more.

The first form of aspirin — today one of the most widely used drugs around — existed all the way back in the 5th century B.C., when the father of medicine, Hippocrates, used willow bark and leaves to relieve pain and reduce fever. It wasn’t until the 1820s, however, that scientists identified the active component in willow bark: salicin.

Salicylic acid derived from willow bark worked to fight aches and pains, but there was a major drawback: it upset the stomach. So, a few decades later, French chemist Charles Frederic Gerhardt found that combining salicylic acid with acetyl chloride made it less irritating.

But Gerhardt, thinking the compound was too complex to make, abandoned the idea. It wasn’t until 1899, when Felix Hoffmann, a German chemist, came across Gerhardt’s recipe and found the compound really worked, that aspirin came to be.

Hoffmann worked for Bayer and convinced the company to make the drug, named Aspirin (the names comes from acetyl chloride [A] and spiraea ulmaria, the plant that salicylic acid comes from [spir] along with an [in] ending).

Bayer released Aspirin tablets in 1915 (it was previously sold as a powder), but, interestingly, had to give up the trademark after World War I as part of Germany’s war reparations. At the Treaty of Versailles, the trademark (along with the trademark for Heroin) was given to France, England, Russia and the United States.

Today aspirin is a household word, and while some believe it should retain its reputation as a miracle drug, others think aspirin may not be as safe or worthwhile as it’s touted to be.

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