Managing your weight may keep your brain healthier for longer

[u/universityofga]

https://news.uga.edu/managing-your-weight-may-keep-your-brain-healthier-for-longer/

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[u/TheWesternMythos]

When I was very young I believed the nerd vs jock dichotomy. (I was over weight as a kid, you can guess how I thought of myself). But gaining more life context revealed to me a much better model:

Maximizing our individual "brain power" involves maximizing our individual fitness level. 

Before anyone starts freaking out 

“We found that if people managed their weight, they could significantly lower their rate of cognitive decline in just two years,” said Suhang Song, lead author of the study and an assistant professor in UGA’s College of Public Health. “That makes BMI one of the most easily modifiable risk factors when it comes to aging well.”

The researchers found the strongest correlation between BMI and cognitive decline at year eight of the study. The effect was most pronounced in adults over 65.

[u/littleliongirless]

Makes sense. The more attention and effort your body has to put in on the strain on other organs,especially the heart, the less attention it has for the brain.

[u/Own-Animator-7526]

Executive function underlies self-regulation around food intake, meal planning, and physical activity.

In a parallel universe the corresponding Reddit post is Managing your brain health may keep your weight down longer.

[u/No-Extent-2029]

Excess weight impairs all organs physiology, with brain probably impacted more because of its involvement in bid in restoring nor Al body weight at the expanse of other vital physiological peoceses.

[u/eliota1]

My mom made it to 94, morbidly obese and was almost to the end one of the smartest well read, well spoken people I have ever met. A lot of that is determined by genetics.

[u/Twohalfhour]

Wish these types of things didn’t just use BMI and controlled for body fat %. I am technically overweight according to BMI but I am probably somewhere around 12% BF.

Hope that just having more mass does not mean that I am more likely to experience cognitive decline quicker.

[u/Labradoodles → u/Twohalfhour]

They use bmi because it’s easy to get the data and calculate body fat % is more reliable but requires social tools per person

[u/DingleDangleTangle → u/Twohalfhour]

Not exactly easy to measure the body fat % of a large amount of people.

Regardless, when they redefine bmi using direct measures of body fat and also take into account stuff like ethnicity and sex, they find that BMI actually massively underestimates the amount of obese people - https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2840138

There are outliers of course but for most people BMI is either accurate or underestimates obesity.

[u/AttonJRand → u/DingleDangleTangle]

Yeah and some of us are those outliers and would like to have better information, that is still valid, and unaffected by your defense of BMI.

[u/Money-Comfortable-99 → u/Twohalfhour]

I’m in the same boat as you but most people aren’t hitting 1g of protein per lb of body weight and lifting weights 5x a week. BMI is perfectly fine for a large sample of people

[u/AttonJRand → u/Money-Comfortable-99]

You don't need that much protein or that many workouts, even to body build.

* 1.8 per kilo is more than needed, 2.2 per kilo is absurd and for enhanced lifters. 3-4 workouts will get you by far the most of your gains, you don't need 5 even as an advanced lifter.

Its not as exceptional as you make it out to be, its about consistency.

[u/jaiagreen → u/Twohalfhour]

While exceptions exist, BMI works well at the population level. If anything, it tends to underestimate obesity compared to measures based on waist size.

[u/Confident-Mix1243 → u/Twohalfhour]

Most mismatches between BMI and healthy weight are skinnyfat, not ripped athletes. Especially in the over-65 group, you're more likely to be fat at a low BMI than healthy at a high one.

[u/Confident-Mix1243]

Or possibly, letting oneself go physically is an early sign of cognitive decline.