Did anyone read "The end of Alzheimers" by Dr. Bredesen? In the book he claims to have the cure, but no one has really talked about his approach. Was it debunked? I'm confused.
Bredesen's protocol is essentially: exercise, sleep, keep your mind engaged, control any correlated issues [like sleep apnea, diabetes], treat correlated infective illness [like EBV] and take some supplements that could positively affect some cause of the illness. I think it's likely that a huge portion of his protocol will prove worthwhile in preventing Alzheimers based on probable causes outside of the AB hypothesis.
... with that all being said, my mother has early onset Alzheimer's disease (hardly over 60), and getting her on any mitigative attempts like elucidated by Bredesen is effectively impossible. She's still independent enough to live and do most things on her own, but injecting new habits has proven really challenging, as apathy is one of the most pervasive symptoms of the disease. She also had years of obstructive sleep apnea that she refused to treat, as she hated the CPAP machine.
Sure, Breseden is likely a bit of a scam artist, and it's very unlikely his protocol reverses the illness as he claims, but his ideas piecemeal are hardly "unproven" as elucidated by folks here. I think it's very unlikely that Alzheimer's finds a "cure" in a pill or some easy treatment--it seems like it's a disease that emerges after years of dysfunction, potentially from many causes, and you can't rebuild Rome overnight. I'd guess that the future of Alzheimer's research will be in prevention.
I've read it. It's about healthy diet, exercise, and sleep. Even if Dr. Bredesen is wrong, having a healthy diet, exercise, and sleep program is still going to be good for you.
He's never actually given ANY evidence to prove what he's suggesting. He's only shown clinical cases which are basically "these people followed my advice and got better" - Which isn't exactly scientific.
It's akin to me saying that if you eat one cheeseburger every day for your whole life, you'll not get dementia. Then when you don't get dementia in the next 10 years, say that it shows what I'm saying must have had some validity behind it.
I don't agree with this comparison. He does say why it would be difficult to prove his assertions on Alzheimer's, but he also brings up cases where people reversed their mental deterioration, which is unheard of. So while the case count is small, if he's telling the truth here, that's a fairly significant result. Even if it is just 1 person.
You're right, do you want to march on over with me to Columbia and let everyone there know that Dale Bredesen actually got it right and his delusional ideas have been overlooked by the entire scientific community?
