HYPERTENSION AGES THE BRAIN

Higher-than-normal blood pressure could be speeding your brain’s decline, even if you’re under 40. Researchers scanned the brains of nearly 600 people between the ages of 18 and 65, and found that the brains of people in their 30s and 40s with blood pressure levels even just slightly higher than a healthy 120/80 bore some similarities to the brains of patients with Alzheimer’s and dementia. (click below to read more)


Even though the subjects had no outward symptoms of memory loss, they had less gray matter (the brain’s store of neurons and axons) and white matter (the brain tissue that carries signals between brain regions) than did peers with normal blood pressure levels. The brain of a 30-year-old with high blood pressure appeared similar to the brain of a healthy 40-year-old, and the higher a person’s blood pressure, the more damage his brain had sustained. “This is quite disconcerting, because high blood pressure is so common,” study author Charles S. DeCarli of the University of California, Davis, tells WebMD.com. Some 50 million Americans, including more and more young people, have elevated blood pressure.