What's good for your heart is good for your head

​I’ve been asked on a number of occasions how people can reduce their risk of getting dementia and I’ve found I’ve been hesitant to answer, perhaps because there are so many causes of dementia it’s difficult to know where to start.

But last week I had one of those light bulb moments of clarity. I was listening to a talk from the Head of Public Health England and he used the phrase, “What’s good for your heart is good for your head!”  This makes so much sense, since vascular dementia has the same risk factors as heart disease and strokes. Plus there’s apparently increasing evidence that individual cases of dementia are often a mixture of Alzheimer’s disease and vascular dementia.

Most of us know what’s good for our heart: a healthy diet, regular exercise, don’t smoke and only drink in moderation. Now whether we live by those principles is another matter; six weeks since New Year and I’m sure most of our resolutions are a dim and distant memory. But perhaps if we realised we were helping our heads as well as our hearts we would have a bit more resolve.

If you want more information on dementia visit our webpage www.dementiaresources.org.uk