The Shocking Link Between Sugar and DEMENTIA

Hello Health Champions. Today we're going to  talk about what really happens to your brain  

when you eat sugar. Even though dementia is  something that mostly happens to older people,  

we have to understand that the process that leads  to dementia started when they were still young. So  

the big question is - how do we stop it before it  starts and what are the real causes of dementia?  

Plus at the end I'm going to show you  how an older forgetful brain can learn  

from something that babies do. Dementia is  basically a form of brain degeneration when  

some of the things the brain used to do don't  work so well anymore and the brain depends  

on producing energy and processing information  and sending messages and signals to the different  

body parts but if you can't do that so much it  comes down to two broad categories of causes  

and the first one is called toxicity and the  second one is called deficiency so toxicity is  

when there's something interfering the brain  tries to produce energy and send signals but  

some things interfering with those signals or the  energy production and deficiency is when the brain  

has to have something that is not provided  or that the brain for some reason doesn't get  

access to anymore so there's a lack of resources  and even though there are many many reasons why  

this could happen i want to show you in this  video how sugar is strongly involved in both  

of these forms of damage the most common form  of dementia is called Alzheimer's and one of the  

hallmark signs is called beta amyloid plaques  and this is in the extracellular tissue where  

you have these damaged proteins that they clump  together and create plaques and they interfere  

with the activity of the brain the second sign  and hallmark is called neurofibrillary tangles  

and this is inside the cell where you're supposed  to have small smooth straight fibers basically  

because of the degeneration they start bunching up  and getting tangled so now that brain cell doesn't  

work so well inside or out and the problem with  diagnosing this is that the final diagnosis can  

only be done postmortem that you don't really find  these unless you open up the person after they  

die there are many causes for dementia there's  genetics there is lifestyle our choices and what  

we eat and what we do and poor lifestyle choices  can create inflammation which is very damaging  

to brain tissue and if we have brain trauma  if we have traumatic brain injury concussions  

then that can damage a little bit of brain tissue  which creates inflammation and if all is perfect  

then that can result but if we have repeated brain  trauma now that inflammatory response can become  

chronic stress contributes to dementia because it  changes blood flow in the brain and age is perhaps  

the strongest influence of all because these  things happen mostly in late age very commonly  

we also hear about coexisting conditions as being  a cause or risk factor but to me it's not a cause  

because these conditions are a result of  lifestyle choices and inflammatory responses  

and stress and not the least insulin resistance  now when it comes to sugar we have to understand  

sugar makes every one of these worse  okay it's going to express our genetics  

less favorably it is the biggest components of  a damaging lifestyle sugar causes inflammation  

sugar prevents the healing of traumatic brain  injuries stress makes us eat more sugar and  

sugar accelerates aging and every one of  these coexisting conditions as well as insulin  

resistance are made worse by sugar and we might go  as far as to say that sugar is the primary cause  

of most of these coexisting conditions but  there is a strong genetic component to dementia  

and especially Alzheimer's there is a gene called  the apo e4 and it predisposes a person it doesn't  

guarantee that a person will get dementia but it  predisposes so if you have one gene of the apoe4  

which 25 of the population has you increase your  risk of Alzheimer's by two to three times two to  

three hundred percent and if you're unlucky enough  to have two genes which two to three percent of  

the population has then your risk increases by 8  to 12 times so it's a dramatic increase it's not  

just a few percent but here's the takeaway that  even if you have both of those genes it doesn't  

guarantee that you're going to get dementia  because there's a lot of people with both genes  

who don't get dementia and the sooner we can make  some good changes the better off we are here's a  

study that suggests that the Alzheimer's disease  starts long long before it's underway long before  

there are any evident plaques so in cancer  they often talk about different stages same  

thing here you have many many years before it's  even detectable and then you have stage one  

two three and four where it's pretty much too  late well the same thing holds true here that once  

you have full-blown Alzheimer's that's like the  equivalent of a stage for cancer so Alzheimer's  

like stage four dementia you don't want to wait  until it's all too late so let's look at one way  

that sugar actually damages the brain here they  talk about how advanced glycation and product  

contribute to the formation of these amyloid  plaques that are associated with Alzheimer's  

and these glycation end products called ages  for short they result from a spontaneous  

and non-enzymatic glycation what does that mean it  means that it doesn't require anything particular  

doesn't require any resources or energy or enzymes  it happens by itself if we have protein and sugars  

side by side then they're a little bit sticky  so they're going to stick and when the glucose  

sticks to the protein that's called glycation  and it damages the protein and that's part of  

the mechanism of how these plaques occur and then  they go on to say that these sugars include the  

glucose that we have everywhere in our body that  is the blood glucose that we're talking about that  

breaks down from every form of carbohydrates that  we eat and that this is the primary energy source  

for the brain now notice they did not say that  it's the only or the exclusive energy source  

for the brain but a lot of people are still  under that impression that the brain has to  

have glucose it has to have glucose if the brain  is feeling a little bit low on energy then you  

have to give it glucose but the brain can run on  glucose and ketones and maybe it's a good idea  

to balance those a little bit which we'll  take a look at later another study says that  

these beta amyloid plaques are neurotoxic  they're like poison to nervous tissue and  

that they're responsible for Alzheimer's disease  and this study went on to show that even though  

the regular beta amyloid is neurotoxic if the beta  amyloid is also glycated then it's even more toxic  

so it's pretty clear that sugar damages the brain  and contributes to dementia but despite that this  

information has not reached the mainstream even  though some of those articles were 30 years old  

they're still mostly regurgitating the old dogma  they're mentioning these same risk factors that i  

talked about they say that some of these  risk factors like age and genes can not be  

affected which is kind of true you don't  change your chronological age but you can  

change your biological age you can't change your  genetic makeup but you can change your genetic  

expression quite a bit and then they went on  to talk about some of the things that you can  

influence and these seem completely random to  me they're talking about high blood pressure  

and they're talking about lack of exercise  but first of all they're very few mentions of  

those factors you could change but they also seem  totally random i want to know what is it about  

high blood pressure that's bad and that is because  it indicates it's a result of poor metabolic  

health and what is it about lack of exercise that  would be bad what is it about exercise that's good  

for the brain so if we learn some more about  the mechanisms now everything comes together  

into a simple picture that we can act on if we  just keep pulling random items out of the blue  

then we'll just compare one list to another and  we'll get more and more confused and even though  

this article went on for several pages when i  did a search on the page search and find there  

was zero mentions of blood sugar zero mentions  of blood glucose or glucose or insulin so the key  

factors that we know are involved with metabolic  disease and dementia there's no mention at all  

and when i searched for sugar it showed up  twice and both times it was about diet and again  

we get regurgitated the same old stuff we've heard  a million times that you need to limit your intake  

of sugar which is a great idea but then they  bundle that together with limiting saturated fats  

not knowing that those two things have the  exact opposite metabolic effect and then they  

throw in of course that to make sure that you  eat plenty of fruits and vegetables and whole  

grain so again zero mentions of sugar and they're  not realizing that these grains are going to turn  

immediately into glucose which stimulates insulin  and makes the whole thing worse and another thing  

that struck me was when they say current evidence  suggests that a heart-healthy diet can also help  

protect the brain and they're saying that  as if there was a possibility of it working  

any other way as if there was a way to eat  something that was good for your left hand and  

bad for your right hand as if you would sacrifice  one organ for the benefit of another it doesn't  

work like that if something is good for you  it's good for you the body cooperates the cells  

work together so i started saying that sugar  contributes to both toxicity and deficiency and  

i think that pretty much demonstrates how sugar is  toxic but here's the confusion for a lot of people  

how can sugar create a deficiency in  the brain if sugar is the primary fuel  

and that's what we're going to talk about next  and it takes a little bit of looking at a few  

different steps but Alzheimer's is often called  type 3 diabetes because there's such a close  

link between dementia and poor metabolic health  so whether we talk about type 1 2 or 3 diabetes  

what they all have in common is that their  glucose is out of control so they all have  

very very high levels of glucose but where they're  different is that the reason for that glucose is  

very different or at least not the same so in  type 1 the insulin is very very low or typically  

non-existent and that's why that glucose is  out of control but for both type 2 and type 3  

we have both high glucose and high insulin  so while type 1 diabetes is kind of its own  

entity type 2 and 3 are sort of the opposite  the glucose is high because the insulin isn't  

working and we've abused the system over many many  years until the insulin doesn't do the job anymore  

so when we talk about type 3 diabetes we're not  really saying that it's a separate distinct type  

because it's not a separate disease they're just  trying to illustrate that how closely related it  

is metabolically to type 2 diabetes that when  we look at them with different blood markers  

and the mechanisms then they're pretty much the  same so it just lets us know that it is the same  

issue one of the key factors in a healthy brain is  to provide it enough energy and one of the biggest  

problems with dementia and Alzheimer's is that the  brain isn't getting enough energy it's starving  

for energy and then it starts degenerating the  brain is about two percent of your body weight  

but it uses 20 of your energy 20 of your calories  20 of your oxygen and that means on average your  

brain tissue is about 10 times more energy  hungry than your average body part but as if  

that wasn't enough there's an area called the  hippocampus that is very much involved with  

memory function and it's one of the first places  to go when people have dementia and Alzheimer's  

and this particular area is even more dependent on  energy it's two to three times more energy hungry  

than the surrounding brain area so if the memory  function is that dependent on energy then we have  

to make sure that we provide that energy or we're  going to have some degeneration and memory loss  

and herein comes the big problem because  when we hear that brain only uses glucose or  

glucose as the primary fuel the first thing people  think of is now we have to raise the blood sugar  

if the brain is starving let's feed it some sugar  and why doesn't that work so here's how it works  

we have a blood vessel that has a certain  amount of blood glucose and in order for  

that glucose to be delivered into a cell such  as a liver cell or a muscle cell or a brain cell  

we need insulin and interestingly not so many  years ago they believed that the brain did not  

depend on insulin to receive the glucose they  said that the glucose will get into the brain  

no matter what but that was incorrect and only  very recently did we learn that so glucose  

needs insulin to get into the cell so there's  like a little gated channel like a little door  

and with the help of insulin then that door  opens and the glucose can get into the cell but  

if the liver and the muscles and various different  tissues become insulin resistant then that  

insulin doesn't open the door as well as it used  to and that can also affect the brain so the  

brain becomes insulin resistant and now we may  have lots and lots of blood sugar but the brain  

is still starving because insulin is high and the  tissues are insulin resistant so interestingly no  

there is a form of fuel that we talked  about we have glucose and we have ketones  

that can fuel the brain and the ketones have  no problem at all they have free access they  

do not require any help to get into the cell  from insulin so we have a fuel a backup fuel  

if you will that can still fuel the brain and  give it energy and here's a super interesting  

article that talks about just that there  was some research headed by Stephen Cunnane  

and they talked about can ketones be like a  rescue fuel a backup fuel for an aging brain and  

they found out first of all that when people had  mild cognitive impairment or Alzheimer's dementia  

then this glucose uptake just like we talked  about it didn't work the insulin wasn't capable  

of delivering the glucose because the cells had  closed the gates and the reason that that happened  

of course was like we talked about the insulin  resistance when the insulin is resisted it can't  

do its job and even though we have lots of glucose  the uptake doesn't work and when they finished  

the study and reported the results they found  indeed that if they could raise the ketones if  

they could get them some MCT oil that breaks  down into ketones if they could give them a  

supplement with ketones with beta-hydroxybutyrate  which is the primary ketone or if they could  

fast them to the body made its own ketones  either way that they could raise ketones  

they improved cognitive function so if they gave  them a memory test or some other mental task  

then they performed better after they received  some ketones so basically they restored the fuel  

supply by giving the brain something else besides  glucose and they found this to work eat both with  

mild cognitive impairment and with Alzheimer's  dementia so obviously if you have full-blown  

Alzheimer's you're not going to get back to normal  but they did better with the ketones than without  

and also they did it with what they called  experimental hypoglycemia so that's they take  

a normal healthy person with normal glucose they  give them an insulin shot so they artificially  

push the glucose to a super low level to  where they get lightheaded and confused  

and then they give them ketones so they're  not supplying any more blood sugar but they  

get some ketones and now their brains start  working again so what does this mean for you  

as an individual if you don't have dementia yet  and you'd like to keep it that way it's that even  

though we've been told forever that glucose is  the primary fuel and super important for the brain  

which it is it doesn't mean that more is better  it's the exact opposite that high glucose level  

an excessive supply of glucose and carbohydrates  creates insulin resistance and the more insulin  

resistance we have the less fuel is available  to the brain and therefore if we want to catch  

this as early as possible we need to understand  how and where insulin resistance starts and if  

we look at glucose we miss the point and if you  have an individual with a healthy glucose level  

healthy and stable and they are insulin sensitive  so they just need a little bit of insulin to keep  

that glucose in control because they eat real  food they eat protein and fat and vegetables so  

they have minor blood sugar swings and very stable  glucose they're insulin sensitive and their brain  

can use all that glucose there's no resistance  there's no limitation there but then  

if we go five more years and we haven't learned  anything we just eat processed foods and sugar and  

soda and donuts and all of these different  things that promote poor metabolic health  

now in five or 10 years we may still have roughly  the same glucose levels so does that mean we still  

have the same amount of fuel available to the  brain not necessarily if during that time we have  

become more insulin resistant then our insulin  levels are up and it requires three four five  

times more insulin to keep that glucose in check  remember that glucose is a controlled variable  

the body needs to keep it and it will make as much  insulin as it has to for as long as it can to keep  

that in check but if we're increasing the insulin  we're becoming insulin resistant and then probably  

the brain is also becoming insulin resistant  and this glucose is not fully available as fuel  

anymore so this brain is starting to starve it's  starting to degenerate and the process of dementia  

has already started even though there may be  20 years before we have a clinical diagnosis  

and if we go a little bit longer here and let's  say that we keep eating standard American diet  

or standard Australian diet I heard is is  also SAD or if we eat the standard UK diet  

that's my favorite uh SUK then we're not gonna  make this any better and our glucose is still  

somewhat controlled but it's starting to slip  into the pre-diabetic or diabetic range and now  

we may have insulin levels that are 8, 10,  15 times higher and now we are very insulin  

resistant so even though this glucose in the blood  is higher we are not providing fuel for the brain  

and we never make any ketones because the insulin  is going to shut ketones down completely so like  

we said dementia doesn't happen overnight and  neither does insulin resistance it is something  

that develops over time as we push our bodies into  a maladaptation as we force the body to adapt in a  

way that creates insulin resistance and there is  a simple test it is very inexpensive relatively  

speaking it's called fasting insulin and if you  fast overnight you draw your blood and they check  

your insulin now you have a really good idea of  where you are because if it's around 10 or 15  

you know you're moderately insulin resistant if  it's 25 but you still have decent glucose you  

know you're one step away from diabetes and it's  easy to do something about it to reverse it so if  

you haven't done it then ask your doctor that you  want the fasting insulin on your next test it's  

one of the best predictors for dementia and maybe  we can learn something from babies brains here  

i find it absolutely fascinating the adult brain  is two percent of our body weight but the newborn  

is 10 of the body weight in the brain and  while adults use 20 of our total energy  

the baby uses 60 percent of all their energy  goes to the brain and on top of that they have  

a tiny tiny little blood volume and they're  born hypoglycemic so there's virtually  

no glucose available for that enormous  brain so what do they do well obviously  

they have to rely on ketones without ketones we  would never have been able to develop these huge  

brains and while adults have to fast or eat a  ketogenic diet with extremely low carbohydrates  

the baby doesn't even need to do that during  their fetal period and while their newborn  

about 30 percent of the brain's fuel come from  ketones even while they're being fed so i find it  

fascinating that in the very beginning of life  and for many people toward the end of their life  

the brain has this enormous energy need that just  isn't supplied by glucose alone and that's where  

ketones come in for the rescue so maybe that  means that even between the beginning and the end  

there is maybe a little bit better balance between  glucose and ketones than just purely glucose  

If you enjoyed this video you're going  to love that one. And if you truly want  

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