Brain Vasculature Changes Important for Predicting Cognitive Impairment

Once your doctor has predicted this problem, WHAT EXACT PROTOCOLS ARE GIVEN YOU TO PREVENT IT FROM HAPPENING? Don't have any do you? 

Your competent? doctor started working on neurovascular coupling 8 years ago, RIGHT?

Neurovascular coupling in humans: Physiology, methodological advances and clinical implications April 2016

The latest here:

Brain Vasculature Changes Important for Predicting Cognitive Impairment

Several measurements of the brain, including blood flow and the brain’s ability to compensate for the lack of it, are better predictors of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) than risk factors like hypertension and high cholesterol.

The findings, published in the journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia, further the prospects of preventing or treating memory problems early before they progress to dementia. 

“People with mild cognitive impairment are at highest risk for the next step, which is dementia,” said Calin Prodan, MD, Oklahoma University College of Medicine, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. “We’re trying to decipher the ‘fingerprints’ of mild cognitive impairment. What happens to the brain when a person moves from healthy ageing to mild cognitive impairment, and is there something we can do to intervene and prevent the decline to dementia?”

The researchers team took several types of brain measurements in people at 3 stages of life: young adults, older adults with ageing but healthy brains, and older adults with MCI. Each group played a short memory challenge game during functional near-infrared spectroscopy recording, and changes in plasma levels of extracellular vesicles (EVs) were assessed using small-particle flow cytometry. The game consisted of trying to memorise increasingly larger sequences of letters.

In the brains of young adults, blood flow increased, giving their brains the energy they needed to meet the demands of the game, a process called neurovascular coupling. In people with healthy ageing brains, the blood flow did not increase as much, but to compensate, their brains engaged other regions of the brain to help with the challenge, a process known as functional connectivity. In the brains of older adults with MCI, the blood flow was greatly reduced, and they lost the ability to compensate by recruiting other parts of the brain to help.

“People with mild cognitive impairment have lost that compensation mechanism,” said lead author Cameron Owens, PhD, Oklahoma University College of Medicine. “There is a drastic change in brain activity in those with mild cognitive impairment.”

Another type of assessment using a blood test gave researchers an additional window into the brains of people with cognitive impairment. This blood analysis measured the amount of cerebrovascular endothelial extracellular vesicles (CEEVs), which are tiny particles released from the cells lining the brain’s blood vessels. Existing research shows that when the inner lining of blood vessels is damaged, it secretes CEEVs. People with MCI  had more CEEVs in their brains than those with healthy ageing brains. Furthermore, MRI images confirmed that people with higher levels of CEEVs also had more ischaemic damage. The researchers believe this is the first time that CEEVs have been measured in a cognitive condition.

“Every brain is different, and there may be differing reasons for cognitive impairment, but having these predictors -- measuring neurovascular coupling, functional connectivity, and CEEVs -- potentially opens opportunities to develop individualised interventions, whether it’s a pharmacological therapy or non-invasive brain stimulation, or something as simple as cognitive behavioural therapy,” said coauthor Andriy Yabluchanskiy, PhD, Oklahoma University College of Medicine.

Reference: https://alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/alz.14072

SOURCE: University of Oklahoma