brain health - corticalmetrics insights (Page 4)

The best types of exercise for your mental health

October 29, 2018

Exercise is an incredible medicine. It can lower blood pressure, prevent diabetes, and alleviate the debilitating symptoms of chronic depression and anxiety. It’s even been shown to promote better skin health, improve eyesight, and ward off the aging process of cells.

On the other hand, not exercising can lead to mood disorders, arthritis - and not surprisingly - obesity and cardiovascular disease. The CDC estimates that inadequate exercise accounts for 11% of total annual healthcare costs in the United States - that’s just over $130 billion each year.

Your child might need more time than you think to recover from a concussion

October 24, 2018

Children are resilient. They can often laugh off traumatic injuries that would send most otherwise healthy adults to the ER. For most of elementary school, there was more of my skin in tatters on the playground than on my knees or elbows, the result of daily high-speed bike crashes and padless tackle football games on the blacktop. (You might be wondering where my parents were during all this. Thank you, I appreciate your concern. They were usually at the doctor’s office with one of my brothers tending to an

Chronic Mold Exposure: Testing for Chronic Inflammatory Response

October 18, 2018

In the previous post, I explained an acute effect of mold on the nervous system, namely that toxins produced by mold act as a GABAA antagonist. But what happens when you have prolonged mold exposure? And what can you do about it? And how do you know if what you’re doing is actually helping?

The name given to mold/biotoxin patients completely explains what goes on when moving from an acute reaction to chronic problems. Chronic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (CIRS) is a well-documented condition with an impressive amount of

Mold Exposure: A Step-by-Step Guide to Tracking Recovery with a Brain Gauge

October 12, 2018

You may think of mold as a relatively harmless part of cheese that’s been in your fridge a little too long, or maybe as the penicillin that you take when you get an infection. But for some with genetic susceptibility, exposure to mold/mycotoxins and other biotoxins (like Lyme disease) can have extreme negative effects on their health and can cause symptoms as diverse as brain fog, fatigue, chronic pain, and/or debilitating psychiatric disorders. The large range of usually nondescript symptoms can leave those afflicted confused and frustrated

The test for aging dementia many people would like to avoid.

October 03, 2018

If you could take a test that predicts you are headed for a degenerative state, would you take it?

Over the past couple of years, I have had several interesting discussions with clinicians using the Brain Gauge revolving around the fact that some patients score poorly and don’t like their scores. These people generally fall into one of three groups:

People that declare that they feel fine and that there is nothing wrong. Doubtful if they will seek help.
People that are disturbed that their scores are poor, but

A sample step by step guide to use your Brain Gauge to monitor your brain health

September 28, 2018

One of the strengths of the Brain Gauge is that, when used correctly, it is able to detect changes in your brain function before those changes are large enough to cause physical symptoms. Early detection is paramount for slowing, halting, or even reversing the progression of any disease, which is why monitoring is so important, especially if you are at increased risk of developing a neurodegenerative disease. Monitoring could (and should) be done by a doctor, but it can also be supplemented with a Brain Gauge (we should note that

Possible relationship between ADHD and early onset Parkinson’s

September 25, 2018

A car can be a very useful tool to get you from Point A to Point B, but if you don’t know how to drive a car, it doesn’t do you much good. Even the most powerful tool isn’t very useful if you don’t know how to use it. Since there’s not a comparable technology to the Brain Gauge on the market today, we understand when people aren’t sure of the best methods for using a Brain Gauge to track their brain health. That’

Factors that influence concussion recovery and brain health: Is there an epidemic?

September 19, 2018

There are a lot of factors to consider when evaluating population brain health, and there is a relationship between speed of concussion recovery and baseline brain health at the population level.

As noted in several previous posts, exercise and keeping an active lifestyle are an important part of maintaining good brain health. And yet, many sports put you at risk for developing a concussion. We hear about football on the news all the time, but athletes in other sports - like soccer, basketball, volleyball, cycling, and even swimming (apparently quite

Are my supplements working?

September 07, 2018

And perhaps more importantly, am I taking the right amount of supplements?

I am fascinated by the number of supplements on the market that claim all kinds of brain health benefits - things like better memory, optimized brain performance, and even reversal of the aging process. While I am not disputing or supporting any of these claims, what really impresses me is how many people take supplements on the blind faith that they will improve or optimize their brain performance. How do we know that supplements are actually helping us?

World Records

August 13, 2018

We’re getting stronger, taller and faster, but are we getting smarter?

Running a four minute mile was supposed to be impossible. Until 1954, most coaches, runners, scientists, and the even world’s top physiologists all declared that humans were physically incapable of a sub 4:00 performance, even given ideal training and race conditions. It was simply too fast.

In 1954 a young medical student named Roger Bannister proved them all wrong. On a windy day in Oxford, England, Bannister ran 1 mile in three minutes and 59.4