Dementia Information: BILINGUALISM DELAYS ALZHEIMER'S ONSET

Dementia Information

Tuesday, November 08, 2011

BILINGUALISM DELAYS ALZHEIMER'S ONSET

I have seen several research articles lately that discuss new evidence that bilingualism is thought to delay the onset of Alzheimer's symptoms. In Medical News Today (http://www.edicalnewstoday.com/releases/235998.php) in mid-October, researchers at St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto found huge differences in the brains of bilingual people as opposed to unilingual people. They found twice as much damage in the bilingual brains and despite the fact that both groups were similar in levels of education and cognitive skills, the bilingual people's brains seemed to be able to handle twice the level of atrophy without displaying twice the level of decline. Dr. Tom Schweizer, who headed the research, feels that the constant switching over in the brain from one language to another enhances the creation of more neuronal networks. In this study, they examined CT scans of patients with AD, and he hopes to repeat the study with a larger patient sample and by using MRIs to observe brain changes. He mentions in the article that previous studies through observation found that bilingualism seemed to delay onset of the AD symptoms by about five years, but that this is the first study to actually find the physical proof in the CT scans of the damage and delay.
I keep thinking how nice it would be to be able to speak Spanish, and now I'm thinking I ought to move forward on this and get started!

Labels: Alzheimer's, bilingualism, neuronal networks

posted by Cindy Keith # 11:58 AM

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Tuesday, November 08, 2011

BILINGUALISM DELAYS ALZHEIMER'S ONSET

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