SHAWN STEVENSON:  Many people are shocked to find out that Alzheimer's disease will be in the top five leading causes of death within the next few years. And the economic impact of Alzheimer's and dementia is shocking. The average person is projected to spend approximately $350,000 on dementia care before eventually dying from the disease. And if we don't do something about this, dementia is projected to bankrupt the United States Medicare system within approximately 15 years. Today is our opportunity to change this situation for the better. Right now, we're about to cover real science backed solutions to this crisis, incredible new information about the brain that you need to know about, and how to protect yourself and your loved ones as we head into the future.

Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia have become a global crisis. Not only does this type of brain, mind, and memory robbing diagnosis devastate patients, but its damaging effects also extend to families, friends, caretakers, and again, even the economy. Now, the big question should be, first and foremost, what is dementia? Dementia and Alzheimer's were previously thought to be caused by things like amyloid plaque, tau proteins, insulin resistance in the brain, and other factors.

Today we know that there isn't just one cause of dementia, it's a conglomeration of insults to the brain leading to what Dr. Dale Bredesen calls network insufficiency. And Dr. Bredesen should know, his groundbreaking study published in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease and Parkinsonism titled, Reversal of Cognitive Decline: 100 Patients, showed that not only can dementia be prevented, but even mild to moderate forms of dementia can be completely reversed.

More recently, Dr. Bredesen shared with me the results of his latest clinical trial published in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, where 84 percent of patients with dementia or mild cognitive impairment had significant improvement in their symptoms. The neural network insufficiency seen in dementia is generally caused by a whole host of things, including inadequate blood flow to the brain. Toxin exposure, infections, nutrient deficiencies, inadequate waste removal from the brain, insulin resistance to the brain, and many other factors. Again, there isn't just one cause of dementia. And it's important to keep in mind that every single case of dementia is unique because every brain is unique.

But one common element rooted in all of these different causes of network insufficiency is connected to the raw materials that you're making your brain cells out of and also the energy. SHAWN STEVENSON:  The very energy that's fueling all the processes in the brain and what those energy substrates are made from. And that's what we're going to be focused on today.

There are approximately 86 billion neurons in your brain, and they are running trillions of processes every microsecond. A lot is going on, and there's a lot of energy required to run all of these processes. And this is why the human brain accounts for only about two percent of your body's mass, but it consumes upwards of 20 to 25 percent of the energy that you consume, of the calories you consume.

The brain is a very, very, energy intensive and hungry organ. And this speaks to just a level one of why our nutrition matters so much. Now keep in mind the human brain is teeming with neurons, but there are also neurons located outside of the brain as well. Neurons are nerve cells and these nerve cells are abundant in places like the human gut, for example. The human gut is a mass of nerve tissue with over 100 million neurons itself. But again, the crown jewel of our nervous system is that immaculate brain buzzing with about 86 billion of these neurons. Now, let's dig a little bit deeper in why food matters so much in the context of Alzheimer's and dementia.

Now, just staying in the same domain with the gut being another prime source of nerve tissue and neurons, there's now a well established connection between our gut health and our brain health. A study titled, The Potential Role of Gut Microbiota in Alzheimer's Disease: From Diagnosis to Treatment was cited in the journal Nutrients. It details how abnormalities in the gut microbiome can literally contribute to dementia. Now, keep in mind, this is just one of the many factors, again, that can create this network insufficiency, add damage or derangement to the gut microbiome to that list. And data is getting funneled back and forth from the gut and brain at all times.

It's very well noted that the vagus nerve, for example, is sending data informing the brain about what's happening in the gut. Nutrients that are needed, abnormalities that are taking place. But more notably and more recently we're looking at this phenomenon of gut permeability, aka leaky gut .And now brain permeability, aka leaky brain, and abnormalities happening in the brain. And this newly studied, again, this is only very recent. Our scientists are starting to understand about the brain biome. So we have a microbiome of our gut, of our skin. We have a microbiome of our heart. And of course the brain wasn't off limits. And that's one of the things that has been theorized is the brain is just this kind of sterile environment. And this is simply not the case. So there's an intimate connection between what's happening in our gut and our brain on multiple levels. 

SHAWN STEVENSON:  But to take things further into why food matters in the context of brain health and dementia is the fact that food literally makes up the tissues of your brain. Your dendrites, your axon terminals, all the pieces and parts of your neurons that allow for your cells in your brain to talk to each other, to enable signal transduction, to enable healthy communication, to assist in waste removal. All the glial cells, all of these things are made from the food that you eat. If you're deficient in the very thing that makes up our brain cells. Obviously, we're going to start to have degeneration and dysfunction, but the human body, we are incredibly resilient. We make adaptations based on these deficiencies.

And that's another one of these things that's added to that network insufficiency are nutrient deficiencies because that's another insult. Our brain can handle a couple of deficiencies, but when that's put on top of the stress. When it's put on top of the insulin resistance. When it's put on top of the disruptions of the gut microbiome. When it's put on top of toxin exposure that damages the brain. When it's put on top of poor blood flow to the brain, this is where we start to see dramatic breakdown.

Now, today we're really going to hone in on making sure that our foundational nutritional needs are met to enable and support adequate blood flow to the brain, to defend the brain against toxin exposures, to support the brain in the removal of metabolic waste. To support in building our neurons, literally creating the brain the support needed for our brain cells to work adequately. We're going to dig deep into the domain of food. And it's important to understand first and foremost, what is the brain itself actually made up when it comes to nutrition? Well, we know that the vast majority of the human brain, the volume of the brain is made from water, all right.

Most of us are big old water heads, right? It's just a part of the puzzle. But if we're looking at the dry weight of the human brain. We're looking at somewhere in the ballpark of about 60 percent of the dry weight of the human brain is made from fat. And this is really our big focus because these specific facts that you're going to learn about today are literally required to make our brain cells and to enable our brain cells to communicate with one another, and also to support in waste removal among many other jobs. And we're gonna start off with an understanding about the first type of these dietary fats, which is phospholipids. This category of fats are present throughout our entire body, but much more inside the human brain. It's an invaluable type of structural fat. This helps to give all of our brain cells shape, strength, and elasticity, all right?

We don't want funky shaped. Brain cells. We don't want our brain cells to come out looking like triangles. Sorry, we want our brain cells to be robust and have a healthy shape. And this is where phospholipids are playing one of their mighty roles. 

SHAWN STEVENSON:  Again, in addition, supporting strength and also elasticity. Elasticity is a part of brain plasticity. And this is the ability of our brain to to grow and to adapt and to change over time. This is a hallmark of healthy brain aging. Now, phospholipids are made almost entirely out of omega 3 fatty acids, DHA and APA, but you can also derive phospholipids from certain foods.

Now again, one of the most interesting things about phospholipids is their contribution to cellular communication, enabling our brain cells to communicate via signal transduction. But another compelling feature of phospholipids is their ability to potentially support mental performance under stress. A recent double blind placebo controlled trial found that the consumption of phospholipids helped to enhance attention and improve reaction time when test subjects were placed under stress. The study participants also reported reduced anxiety and a heightened sense of mental energy. So again, this is something supportive of protecting our brain against stress.

And as you know, we live at a very stressful time and we need these nutrients to help to protect our brain. So again coming up we're going to dig deep and cover seven specific foods that are shown to support Brain health and defend the brain against dementia and Alzheimer's. But for now here are a list of foods that are rich in phospholipids. This includes a variety of fish, crab meat, Fish roe, caviar, krill, krill oil, soybeans, milk, oats, and sunflower seeds are all viable sources of phospholipids. But keep in mind, one of the most remarkable sources of phospholipids comes from egg yolks. All right, now we're going to circle back to that shortly, but again, I just want to provide you with some great food sources of phospholipids.

Now let's move on to the second type of these critical fats for supporting our cognitive function and defending the brain against dementia. The second type is called sphingolipids. Sphingolipids function as building blocks for biological membranes and play important signaling and regulatory roles within our brain cells. Some of the remarkable attributes of sphingolipids include they have the ability to change the architecture of our brain cells. Sphingolipids can alter the functions that our cell membranes participate in and enable them to do things in a different way. Again, if we're talking about adaptation, this is where sphingolipids really shine. They're also involved in intracellular signaling and can alter the behavior of cells altogether. Sphingolipids also play roles in disease prevention, including cancer prevention, because they assist in limiting cell replication and signaling programmed cell death or apoptosis. Some dense food sources of sphingolipids include eggs. butter, cream, beef, yogurt, rice, and sweet potatoes.

SHAWN STEVENSON:  Now, this leads us to our third and final critical fat for building and supporting our neurons. And this goes hand in hand with sphingolipids because sphingolipids, a certain type is called sphingomyelin. And this is the insulation of all of our brain cells in our nerve pathways. And the predominant compound that makes up this myelin is cholesterol. The human brain contains the highest level of cholesterol in our bodies. It actually contains about 20 percent of our body's cholesterol located in our brain. Again, it makes up only about 2 percent of our body's mass, but about 20 percent of our cholesterol is found there and about 80 percent of that cholesterol in the brain is located within the myelin. Myelin is the fatty sheath coating around our nerve axons that facilitate electrical impulse conduction.

So information being able to be transmitted throughout all of our cells. And again, it's really cool to think about that the human body and the human brain is running on all of this powerful electrical energy, but we need insulation. We know if those wires are exposed, they're going to be subject to easier damage. They're going to be subject to sensitivity, but also when things are covered and coated, they have much more durability that transition and transformation of energy is potentially able to happen faster, especially when those nerve connections are well protected. All right. Now here's an important caveat about myelin.

And about cholesterol when it comes to our brain. The human brain produces its own cholesterol. All right, so Having conversations with my good friend and neuroscientist, Dr. Lisa Moscone out of NYU and her looking at what's happening when we consume certain nutrients. The impact that it has on our brain, actually visually seeing these changes and having these conversations and sharing the cholesterol that we're including through our diet isn't something that directly is increasing the amount of cholesterol that we might find in our brain. But also Our dietary cholesterol doesn't necessarily translate over into the cholesterol found in our lipid panels right in our blood work.

It's very different from the superficial watch your cholesterol intake. Dietary cholesterol dramatically increases the cholesterol that you find in your body anywhere. It doesn't really work like that. Our bodies are very great at breaking things down and building things up as needed. But we do need to provide those raw materials, those base nutrients for our brain to be able to create the cholesterol that it needs.

And this speaks to, yes, targeting the inclusion of some dietary cholesterol, absolutely. But also making sure that we're getting a spectrum of essential fats that are critical for the brain. Those sphingolipids, those phospholipids, also a wide variety of fat soluble vitamins like vitamin D, vitamin A, and understanding that. Our bodies, our biology is so intelligent. 

SHAWN STEVENSON:  In particular, our brain obviously is very intelligent at building the compounds that it needs. But we need to provide all of these raw materials because it doesn't just happen out of thin air. All right. So again, this is just to cover the foundational, the most important nutrient input that makes up the brain itself, because the vast majority of the human brain is made of fat, but very specific types of fat are critical for us to get through our nutrition.

Now this is going to lead us into these seven specific foods backed by science, backed by peer reviewed evidence. These seven specific foods that boost our brain health and also help to defend our brain against dementia. And we're going to lead things off with food number one, wild caught salmon. Fatty fish are well established to be rich in very specific types of fat that help to build our neurons and also allow for things like signal transduction. In particular, they are rich in DHA, that's docasa hexanoic acid, and EPA. Ecassa pentanoic acid. And these omega 3 fats are critical for the maintenance of our brain and our nervous system. And this is why fatty fish like salmon can improve our cognition, our mental health as well, and also defend the brain against degeneration.

A brain imaging study cited in the journal Neurology found that people who have the lowest intake of EPA and specifically DHA have the highest rate of brain shrinkage, literally losing our solid brain volume when we're deficient in DHA specifically. The researchers noted that the lack of EPA and DHA in the diet was particularly harmful to the memory center of the brain, which is known as the hippocampus, which lost neurons at a rate equivalent to two additional years of abnormal brain aging.

The researchers stated that people who ate less than four grams a day of these omega 3s showed the highest rate of brain shrinkage. While those who ate 6 grams or more had the healthiest, shrink proofed brains. Alright, so again, this is backed by science. When we're talking about the importance of including fatty fish in our dementia prevention program, this is why.

This is why. Plus, researchers at Rush University Medical Center uncovered that adults who eat at least one seafood meal per week do in fact perform better on cognitive skills tests than people who consume less. And a meta analysis published in Translational Psychiatry found that The omega 3s found in fatty fish have a beneficial effect on individuals with major depressive disorders.

Now, again, this is another aspect of Alzheimer's and dementia that's not talked about, and it's the mental health relationship as well. Now, the question is, how do we meet those needs to shrink proof our brains? How do we get in those adequate amounts of those omega 3s? SHAWN STEVENSON:  Well, this is going to depend on the variety of salmon. Amen. And if we're talking about wild Alaskan coho salmon all the way to wild Alaskan king salmon, an eight ounce filet can provide anywhere from one and a half grams to five grams of these vital omega threes. Again, it's going to depend on the type of salmon. Coho is going to be at the lower end, you know, the whole at the end, and then the king is going to be a little bit richer.

It's interesting how those names go on these fish. All right, there's other types of fish as well, but keep in mind there's farm raised fish and their omega 3 content is going to be influenced by what the people are feeding these fish. And it could be richer or lower in omega 3s, but there are some concerns. Obviously we've farmed fish. But we know that if we're getting wild caught fish, we have a dependable, reliable, consistent source of these omega 3s based on, you know, again, hundreds of years of fish doing these fish things and decades of data from scientists who are analyzing the makeup of these fish.

All right. So that's number one on this list of these powerful foods to help to defend the brain against dementia. Number two on this list is coffee. Many of us are well aware that coffee can improve our mental performance, but few people know that regularly drinking coffee has been shown to help to prevent cognitive decline and reduce the risk of developing Alzheimer's and even Parkinson's disease.

This attribute referenced in the journal Practical Neurology is yet another reason why smart coffee consumption makes the list of neuro nutritious beverages. One of the reasons for coffee's protective benefits was uncovered by researchers at Stanford University. These scientists recently deduced that the caffeine found in coffee is able to defend the brain against age related inflammation.

Their research revealed that light to moderate coffee drinkers actually live longer and more healthfully thanks in part to the protection that coffee derived caffeine provides by suppressing genes related to inflammation. Now, if we're looking at that network insufficiency again, inflammation is on that list.

That's another thing to add to that list of what can be underlying network insufficiency? Now again that inflammation can be driven by nutrient deficiencies. It can be driven by an inability of the brain to remove metabolic waste. It can be driven by Inadequate blood flow. The list goes on and on and on, but inflammation is another one of those hallmarks that, now, this is one of those things that somebody might take and run with it.

They might grab the baton from Sha'Carri Richardson, take off right to the coffee shop. All right. We've got to keep this in context, light to moderate coffee consumption. 

SHAWN STEVENSON:  There are diminishing returns. And also we can get into a place where it can be detrimental. All right. But according to this data, a robust amount of data.

Coffee is incredibly protective to the brain and also again It is proven to help to defend the brain against Neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer's. That is pretty freaking remarkable and keep in mind when you're running to the coffee shop. When you're running to qt or to mcdonald's the quality of that coffee matters because if it's riddled with pesticides and herbicides and all these common things that are found in general coffee that's out there on store shelves and in all these respective coffee hubs. This is going to be something that not only has diminishing returns, but can be detrimental, can be incredibly damaging from what we know now to the brain in his defense against Alzheimer's disease.

There's a growing body of data that's affirming how exposure to these toxins is in that network insufficiency equation. So we want to make sure that the coffee that we're consuming is organic, and ideally, if we want to even upgrade that coffee consumption. It's going to yes, be organic, but also include neuro-protective and neuro-regenerative time tested sources of nutrition, like medicinal mushrooms, specifically the medicinal mushroom lion's mane. Scientists at the University of Malaya discovered that compounds in lyosomae are able to significantly improve the activity of nerve growth factor in the brain. Nerve growth factor is essential in the regulation of growth, maintenance, proliferation, and survival of our various brain cells. This speaks to prevention.

This speaks to support and protection of our brains. The one company that I've actually been utilizing their coffee for years that has dual extracted Lion's Mane and Chaga and organic coffee is from Four Sigmatic. And if you want to check them out, they've got instant coffee, they've got ground coffee, they've got whole bean, they've got half calf that has adapted gins and all kinds of cool stuff.

They really, really are great people. As a matter of fact, they just sent my wife a gift yesterday. They just sent my wife a special gift and had this little gold spoon. It was just like something that they just did just for her and some of their new incredible organic teas. And they just sent her this great, beautiful box and it said Inside the box when you open the box, it's like all this kind of floral print. It says tea time is me time. All right, it's something super sweet and this is just how they're just really amazing people. And I highly encourage you to check them out.

And also by the way, you're gonna get 10 percent off of All of their incredible coffee blends, their teas, their elixirs, all their medicinal mushroom blends. Again, they're dual extracted, the very, very best in the world. Go to foursigmatic.com/model. 

SHAWN STEVENSON:  That's F O U R S I G M A T I C. com/model for 10 percent off store wide. Again, the quality of your coffee matters, but it is, again, clinically proven to help to defend the brain against dementia.

Moving on on our list of these seven powerful foods that boost brain health and also help to defend the brain against dementia. Number three is olive oil. Groundbreaking research conducted by scientists at Auburn University asserts that extra virgin olive oil has the potential to reduce brain inflammation, improve autophagy in the brain, the clearance of old brain cells and helping to recycle compounds, and improve the function of the blood brain barrier.

It's pretty remarkable. Now again, autophagy is part of the brain's self cleaning process, and it's the body's way of cleaning out damaged cells in order to make room for new growth and maintenance. And one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease that's been studied for decades now is the accumulation of waste in the brain. Really seeing dementia and Alzheimer's in one light as an inability of the brain to efficiently clean itself. Now again, that's just part of the network insufficiency, so I don't want to get caught up on that one thing. But this is one of those things that's been noted for decades. And supporting autophagy is serious business when it comes to supporting our brain health. A recent study published in the journal Current Biology states that Autophagy is actually required for new memory formation.

So please, please hear what I'm saying. If we're talking about the creation of new memories, maintaining our memories, this is one of the scariest aspects of Alzheimer's and dementia is losing our memories. Losing our memories of who we are, of our loved ones, of how to take care of ourselves, of how to function in the world. If we're going to build and maintain new memories autophagy is a key part of this equation and Olive oil remarkably. It's not an accident that all of these long lived cultures. These blue zones that have all these centurions and people living to ripe old ages with their mental faculties with their mobility with their ability to again, just to live a long healthy life. Not just a long lifespan, but a long health span, olive oil is one of those foods that's found in multiple areas where people live long healthy lives.

Now, a couple of tips about the olive oil. Again, extra virgin means that it's cold processed. All right, so cold process, because in processing, if the oil is heated too much, it can damage the oils and create oxidation in a bottle. It can just create something that's already bottled up oxidation and oxidation in one light is looked at as an accelerated aging process. And what we want is the opposite. We want anti oxidants and that's what olive oil is really just so incredibly rich in. 

SHAWN STEVENSON:  It's oleocanthal rich when it's extra virgin olive oil and this is why it's also traditionally bottled in dark glass containers. Dark glass because these oils are even sensitive to light. Light can create oxidation as well. So look for olive oil that's bottled in dark glass, not dark plastic and definitely not light plastic. All right, because now we know about all of these microplastics and nanoplastics that have this incredible leaching potential when it's around oils, all right.

So again, these are pro inflammatory and now we're finding these microplastics in the human brain, all right. And this is just one of those things that continues to evolve this equation of network insufficiency. We want to do our best to avoid unnecessary exposure to these microplastics. So definitely, if you're getting olive oil looking to protect your brain and it's incredible brain food. Don't get the stuff that's bottled in plastic, right? That's just, that's just silly pants. All right. So that was number three on our list. We're going to move on to number four and number four on this list of these incredible seven foods that boost brain health and protect and defend the brain against Alzheimer's and dementia.

Number four is sweet potatoes. An analysis published in Archives of Pharmacal Research revealed that the anthocyanins in sweet potato exhibit memory enhancing effects. The researchers believe this is due to its potent antioxidant benefits. While another study found that sweet potatoes can be helpful in fat loss and reduce the risk of degenerative brain diseases like Alzheimer's.

Now, this should be headline information that sweet potatoes. Have such a great benefit in protecting the brain against degenerative diseases. But the question also should be why sweet potatoes have some sweetness, right? Are we looking at a situation where you know, we want to make sure that the brain is insulin sensitive. Well another study I actually found that people who consume sweet potatoes had a greater drop in glycated hemoglobin levels or hemoglobin A1C levels.

This is a marker for insulin resistance, diabetes, and also Alzheimer's disease. Alright, so sweet potatoes are one of those special foods that really support our brain health. That support healthy blood sugar levels. This is one of those foods that's easy to add in. You know, we've got wild caught salmon. You know what to do a wild caught salmon, right? We can bake it. We can put it in the air fryer. We can make fish tacos. We can make a casserole. There's so many different ways to use that incredible food. Obviously, you know what to do a coffee. Coffee is just one of the most popular beverages in the world, but we've got obviously the traditional cup of joe and their respective ingredients you can add.

SHAWN STEVENSON:  We've got cold brew and iced coffees hitting the scene in a big way. You can use coffee as ingredients for other things like protein drinks and stuff like that, but coffee isn't one of those things that's complicated to use either. And then we talk about olive oil, obviously great for making salad dressings and finishing dishes, right? So the dish is done and maybe plated and you drizzle some olive oil over it or obviously for cooking purposes. But you want to be mindful of the level of heat so we don't increase the oxidation. But olive oil again, very simple to use sweet potatoes. Yes, you can bake a sweet potato, alright. That's a that's a good way to go Very easy entry level, but then we can also make a sweet potato enchilada casserole.

All right. We can make sweet potato pancakes. All right. There's so many different ways to utilize sweet potatoes in creative, fun, delicious ways. So keep that in mind. And if you want some ideas on that? Definitely check out the E Smarter Family Cookbook because it's got some great recipes with this amazing food.

Let's move on to number five on our list of these seven foods that are proven to boost brain health and prevent dementia. Number five is MCT oil or medium chain triglyceride oil. Researchers at Yale University published data purporting that MCTs can readily cross the blood brain barrier and be utilized by our brain cells as a clean fuel. In a remarkable study published in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, sought to find out if MCTs could have an impact on improving the condition of patients with Alzheimer's disease. The scientists in the study discovered that since MCTs are quickly metabolized by the liver, prompting the production of ketones, those ketones are then able to easily cross the blood brain barrier and provide an alternative fuel source to the glucose impaired brain cells of Alzheimer's patients.

The scientists found that the consumption of MCTs directly led to improved cognitive function in mild to moderate forms of Alzheimer's disease and cognitive impairment. People need to know about this. There are incredible foods and sources of nutrition that can help to resolve and improve the condition of Alzheimer's and dementia.

It exists already, but most people simply don't know about this. Now obviously, we want to focus on prevention. This condition is very difficult to deal with once it takes hold. But again, affirming the data of my friend and colleague, Dr. Dale Bredesen, this is a condition that can be resolved as well. It is not the final say about anyone. But again, the sooner that we can address it. And also again, prevention is, as they say worth a pound of cure. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. And definitely check out Dr. Dale Bredesen's interview here on the model health show after you complete this episode for more information on that.

SHAWN STEVENSON:  So MCT oil, medium chain triglyceride oil. I've been utilizing for probably about 10 years now, maybe a little bit longer, but again, the sourcing matters. I want to make sure that it's coconut derived and from the very best source possible, I get my MCT oil. From the incredible folks at Onnit! Go to onnit.com/model, and you're going to get 10 percent off their phenomenal MCT oil. That's O N N I T.com/model for 10 percent off their MCT oil. And also they've got some phenomenal science backed, human nutrition. And they put many of their supplements through randomized double blind placebo controlled trials affirming their benefits. They really do, do their homework and they are incredible. So definitely head over there check them out onnit.com/model. Great source for MCT oil that you can trust.

Now, moving on to number six on our list of these seven foods that are proven to boost brain health and prevent dementia. Number six on this list is leafy greens, including spinach. Chicago's Rush University Medical Center found that people who ate one to two servings of leafy green vegetables like spinach, each day, experienced fewer memory problems and cognitive decline compared with people who rarely ate these leafy greens. And study participants who ate about two servings a day had brains that were roughly 11 years younger. Now the test subjects underwent a battery of annual tests to assess their cognitive function in areas like episodic memory, working memory, visual spatial ability, and much more.

All right. So they're really doing their due diligence to look at what's going on in their brains and their abilities, and also what's going on with their diet and lifestyle factors, and leafy greens stood out. Now, there's a lot of different camps when it comes to the leafy greens today. Alright, we got people that are like, the spinach is trying to kill you, then we got people that are like, popeye ate spinach? You see what Popeye could do? And spinach is the greatest thing ever. It depends. As with all of this stuff that's been utilized for centuries by humans. Humans have been eating leafy greens for a long time, all right. And even again, if you can check in with your ancestors, check in with your relatives and their lineage and see, was it a part of their diet?

Maybe that can be an indicator of maybe this is a food you want to look at. My wife being from Kenya, they have skooma wiki. Skooma wiki. All right, it basically loosely translates to make it through the week. All right, and this was a variety of amazing greens all right, and so being a nutritious source for families to be able to again. This isn't necessarily the very best food But it's one of those foods that can help them to meet some nutrient needs. And also, you know, it's one of those things where there's a variety of different foods that can be utilized under that umbrella, right? So there's chard, there's collard, there's kale, and spinach really does appear to be one of those that stands up in multiple studies to have a lot of benefit.

SHAWN STEVENSON:  But there are some compounds. There can be some anti nutrients. What can you do? Cook it. If you're worried about the anti nutrients, cook it. Helps to eliminate a lot of those anti nutrients. But also you're going to be losing some other properties, you know? So again, it's just doing what feels good to you. We don't have to jump right into any of these diet framework. Dogmas that say that a particular real food is really beneficial or really dangerous. But again, I like to look at the data and the data shows that this is potentially a really, really great food for protecting your brain and cognitive function. So number six on this list, regardless of the controversy around green leafy vegetables that exist today, Number six on this list is green leafy vegetables, specifically spinach.

I'm going to wrap up here with number seven on our list of these seven science backed foods that are proven to reduce the risk of Alzheimer's and also boost our brain health overall. Number seven is the incredible edible egg. Now remember that egg yolks are a titan when it comes to phospholipids with a little over 10, 000 milligrams of phospholipids per 100 grams of product. Another phenomenal brain boosting nutrient that's found in eggs is choline. Choline is one of the most important things for developing your lifelong memory capabilities.

Research conducted by scientists at the University of North Carolina postulates that your memory characteristics are heavily impacted by how much choline your mother ate during her pregnancy with you and lactation. Now, even if you feel like, well, I didn't maybe get enough, maybe my mom didn't get enough choline in. That's okay because choline and shout out to all the moms just love for the moms. You're lucky. You're lucky. She brought you here. All right Choline is still important throughout our entire lifetime. It's one of those things that we can proactively get in our diet, proactively. Choline is important to the memory center of our brain specifically, but it's a whole brain nutrient truly. But especially for the hippo campus and keep in mind, of course, it's another one of those foods.

It's controversy. It's Controversy. Eggs have gone in and out of favor and flavor and fashion more than fanny packs. All right, they just keep they're in and out and in and out. But the myths around eggs again, it's been utilized for thousands of years. The myths around eggs and heart disease specifically have been put to bed again and again. And this includes by researchers at the Department of Nutritional Sciences at the University of Connecticut. Their data concluded that eating whole eggs including the egg yolks does not translate to increased risk of heart disease and problematic ratios of cholesterol.

In fact eating eggs Was found to decrease the risk of heart disease when you're actually doing a study. You don't just say oh this food has because that's what happened. When cholesterol was villainized was like, oh this food's high in cholesterol, it's bad. It's bad. They didn't actually do any studies on that? They didn't actually look at the data. 

SHAWN STEVENSON:  When the data is analyzed by real researchers, real scientists who are doing this work. You find that it actually decreases the risk of heart disease and also decreases the risk of Alzheimer's. So these are seven powerful foods to add to your family's menu on a consistent basis.

This issue with Alzheimer's and dementia is, again, it is skyrocketed and it is continuing to climb, but we can stop it. We can do something about this. And today we looked at a foundational aspect of that, which is our nutrition. And I highly encourage you to share this with the people that you care about and definitely check out the episode that I did with Dr. Dale Bredesen for much, much more on this subject matter. Because again, we've got to handle this issue in our lifetime because we do not want to pass this down the burden of this condition to our children, to our grandchildren. Let's make a change now.

I appreciate you so much for tuning into this episode today. We've got some amazing masterclasses and world class guests coming your way very, very soon. So make sure to stay tuned, take care, have an amazing day, and I'll talk with you soon. And for more after the show, make sure to head over to themodelhealthshow.com. That's where you can find all of the show notes. You can find transcriptions, videos for each episode. And if you've got a comment, you can leave me a comment there as well. And please make sure to head over to iTunes and leave us a rating to let everybody know that the show is awesome. And I appreciate that so much and take care. I promise to keep giving you more powerful, empowering, great content to help you transform your life. Thanks for tuning in.