23. Neil Nedley | Breakthroughs in the Prevention and Treatment of Dementia | 2026 KYTN Camp Meeting

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:00]have enjoyed um for lunch and now as we are gathered in this place touch our hearts speak through Dr. Nedley and thank you so much for the opportunity to be here in Jesus name we pray. Amen.

[00:00:18]Thank you Pastor Joel.

[00:00:29]So, uh, tomorrow I'm listed on your schedule.

[00:00:34]Uh, but I actually have to leave after the second presentation for Weimar University.

[00:00:41]Uh, it's the academy graduation and I have to partake in that. Plus, the academy seniors asked me to be their speak their graduation speaker. So, it's not often they have the head of the institute uh that's asked. But uh we of course accepted that responsibility.

[00:00:59]So um uh but tomorrow at this time there will still be a speaker and that speaker is going to be my wife Erica. The conference said um you can only get out of it if you have your wife Erica speak and of course uh she speaks through cooking. Uh you might have seen her book. See if I have it up here. It's it's your nourish brighten up breakfast and uh brighten up breakfast and of course there's brunch uh recipes there as well and uh she has other recipes as well that she'll be going over and uh so this stage will actually turn into a big cooking school stage uh tomorrow and you'll also learn some nutrition facts that we're not giving you today and so there will be some crossover in regards to recipes that are going to help as far as depression, anxiety, and memory and mental health. But there will be additional ones that she'll be doing as well. And I would encourage you to buy that book today because at the end of that cooking school, all the books will be sold and you won't have a chance to uh to get them. And so uh I would encourage you get brighten up uh breakfast. So, uh, today we're going to be talking about memory, as Pastor Joel mentioned, dementia, causes, prevention, and treatment.

[00:02:29]So, we're going to classify the four most common causes of memory loss today and how they have changed over time.

[00:02:36]We're going to learn how diagnosing dementia early can actually be very important in halting its progression and maybe reversing it.

[00:02:45]uh we're going to understand the influence of dietary components on metabolites produced by microbes and we're going to explain the risk factors for the development of all four causes of dementia and how to avoid those risk factors and we're going to be talking about managing and improving dementia through specific proven therapies.

[00:03:06]So 6.7 million Americans have it.

[00:03:12]Uh it's continuing to rise. It is a major problem in our society. Over 14 million Americans will have it by 2043 and it's now the sixth leading cause of death in America. When I wrote my original proof positive book, uh, as you know, I'm an internal medicine physician. This is adult diseases of the internal organs. And there are many diseases that nutrition and lifestyle can intervene and maybe even do better than than pharmaceuticals and other approaches. By the way, I have that book here, too. Um, I was able Nourish gave us these books so that we could show them to you today because we didn't bring any ourselves.

[00:03:53]But, um, this is our book, Prove Positive: Science-based Strategies for Disease Prevention and Reversal. And of course, we have new um chapters uh that were not in the old proof positive. We all have a whole gastronurology section.

[00:04:09]So Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, gastroosophageal reflux disease, irritable bowel syndrome and of course uh we also have some additional chapters. Um we are in our original proof positive we talked about cancer prevention. We have a whole chapter on cancer treatment in regards to nutrition and lifestyle principles that have been proven to be effective as part of a cancer treatment uh modality. And we're getting a lot of positive feedback. This book just came out in the in the um fall, but we had been using some of these principles beforehand. And everywhere I go, I find a cancer survivor who is smiling uh that instituted these principles. And um and of course there's a lot of other chapters as well, including uh viruses uh and of course our immune system and of course heart disease, hypertension, osteoporosis.

[00:05:06]Uh what about protein? You're hearing a lot about protein today. Uh there's a big chapter here on the great meat and protein myth. Uh you'll want to see the the true science behind that. Yes, protein is important, but uh if we overemphasize it, we're going to get into some significant problems. And so um uh this book is also available. In fact, Nourish told me uh that they wanted me to sign. So, I actually opened up one and whoever is the first one to get this one at Nourish gets a signed copy from Dr. Nedley. The rest are all wrapped up. So, um when I originally came out with Prove Positive, which was 20 plus years ago, Alzheimer's was not even in the top 10 causes of death. And so uh it was uh a more unusual cause of death and now it's the sixth leading cause of death. More deaths than breast and prostate cancer combined. Those deaths get a lot of publicity, but Alzheimer's is actually more common in America. One person every 60 seconds is newly diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease.

[00:06:26]In seniors, one out of every three deaths is currently from dementia. So if a senior dies, a lot of times they're trying to avoid cancer, heart disease.

[00:06:35]That's good. But one out of three chance they're actually going to die from a disease of the mind called dementia. 16 million Americans provide unpaid care for people with dementia. So it's a very expensive illness as well because we don't want to put our relative in a nursing home or things like that. And so there's a lot of care that's given for these and then sometimes that nursing home still has to take place and of course that's expensive as well. And uh the last year I looked at it $345 billion were spent in one year on dementia. Huge amounts of funds going towards this terrible disease.

[00:07:22]So dementia is loss of memory severe enough that it impacts a person's ability to carry out work, school or daily activities um you know at a high level. One out of eight over age 65 already has dementia and if you're fortunate to live to 85 there's a 5050 chance you're going to have dementia.

[00:07:48]However, dementia should not be considered a normal part of aging.

[00:07:53]That's probably worth remembering.

[00:07:56]Dementia should not be considered as a what? A normal part of aging.

[00:08:04]So, let me explain a little bit. When we get older, I don't know if you've noticed for those that are older, we start losing some mitochondria in our muscles. [snorts] You know, you can have an elderly person remember how they used to stand up as a younger person and now they try to stand up and there's this delay as they as they slowly get up.

[00:08:35]uh this is actually a normal part of aging. Now we can prevent that to some extent by working out and fitness activities but the older you get the fitness activities are just helping you to maintain. If you don't do fitness activities you're going to lose it. When you were younger you could build up with these fitness activities.

[00:08:57]But the brain was not designed to go down with age. In fact, if you were smart when you're a very young person, you should be very smart as an older person. So the brain because of this bloodb brain barrier and the protective elements was actually not designed to deteriorate with age. So dementia is not only memory loss. Changes in personality can develop. There's people that have never used four-letter words in their whole life of non-dementia that are starting to use them. They're getting upset. They don't have the emotional control.

[00:09:36]Behavioral and psychological changes develop and then eventually loss in ability to retain urine and stool. Of course, increase in irritability and as I mentioned anger and even frequent cursing can occur uh in the dementia phase. When we look at the worldwide stats, it's even more uh incredible. 55 million people currently have dementia worldwide. It'll be 82 million by 2030 will more than double to 139 million by 2040. And a new case is diagnosed in the world every 3 seconds.

[00:10:14]And when we take a look at the worldwide cost, it's pretty amazing. But it basically corresponds to $23,000 23,796 per person with dementia. And that's worldwide. It's more expensive, of course, in the US, but when you look at the worldwide stats, it's pretty amazing. So 1,313.4 Four billion is actually talking about over a trillion dollars spent every year on this disease.

[00:10:48]So the four common forms of dementia, Alzheimer's dementia, this was named after a neurologist from Tubingen. I've actually spoken at his university uh in Germany uh that's a prestigious uh university and he was the one that diagnosed the pattern and the pathology.

[00:11:09]Vascular dementia however is almost just as common. This is actually disease of the blood vessels going to the brain and these are getting blocked off with cholesterol uh and uh other things affecting the circulation. High blood pressure by the way we'll talk about this. It's very important to prevent dementia, to prevent yourself from getting high blood pressure or treating it through natural means or preventing the high cholesterol. Those two things combined greatly accelerate the chance that you're going to have dementia and greatly accelerate its worsening. Then there's a new form that has arisen that we didn't have back when I wrote Prove positive called digital dementia.

[00:11:55]And this is essentially dementia and memory loss due to the normal use of smartphones and laptop computers.

[00:12:06]And this is what I talked about on Tuesday where these things drive you to distraction. If you're always being distracted, your working memory starts to shrink um down. And so, uh, this can start to manifest even in a younger person, um, you know, who's in their 20s or even late teens starting to get digital dementia in regards to their memory. Now, fortunately, that can be reversible or dementia due to mental illness. [snorts] So, many people are not aware, but depression, if it's not treated, will greatly accelerate your chance of developing dementia. In fact, one of the primary symptoms of depression is lack of focus and concentration, which can affect your memory and can affect your productivity.

[00:12:55]The world health goals for dementia.

[00:12:59]Diagnose cases early. As I mentioned, this is critically important. Optimize physical health, cognition, activity, and well-being. Detect and treat behavioral and psychological symptoms. and provide information and long-term support to caregivers. Those are the WH goals, but we wouldn't necessarily have to worry about three and four if we're working really hard on one and two.

[00:13:27]So, how do we diagnose dementia early in physician offices? If someone starts complaining of memory, chances are the primary caregiver is going to give them a mini mental status exam. It's called the MMSE.

[00:13:45]It's a 30point questionnaire and it's going to test some of your cognitive ability and memory. But it turns out this test does not detect early dementia.

[00:13:58]Uh you can have early dementia and excel on this test. you could get 29 out of 30, maybe even 30 out of 30. And so the primary care doctor is going to say, "Well, you're all right. You know, I know your husband's complaining about your memory, but you know, uh, he might have a memory problem, too. Maybe that's why he thinks your memory is bad." But, uh, the mini mental status exam, uh, really should be replaced by what we call the MCI. This stands for mild cognitive impairment. And this will pick it up at an early stage. I would recommend anyone who, you know, even in their 50s, it would be good to take the MCI exam. Now, it will cost you a little bit out of pocket because it was developed by a neurologist that has the test patented and uh but it it is a test that you need another caregiver to give it to you. So, they have to be trained to be able to give it. Several our nurses uh and even some of our medical assistants are trained to give this because we give this test very often uh in the clinic and it will start picking up memory loss at an early age. You know, often what happens when mom and dad retire uh and their kids are busy, the kids don't even notice that the memor is going down. And it's not maybe at holiday that they recognize, whoa, they're slipping a little more than I thought. And by then, if they're noticing it, chances are this is no longer mild. This is probably moderate, getting close to severe. So, uh I would encourage it's a great test to do maybe every year or two. uh and and you can track your memory um over time. So that's called the MCI memory test. So working memory resides as I mentioned in the frontal lobe and lasts less than a minute.

[00:15:57]This form of memory is commonly referred to as your attention span or working memory. And as mentioned, it will last up to one minute. And if you're not utilizing it or storing it somewhere, it's going to end up being erased.

[00:16:15]But if it's not erased, it's going to go into short-term memory. And this gets transferred over to the temporal lobe of the brain. That's the area of the brain uh right above the ear.

[00:16:28]And that lasts between a few minutes and a few weeks. an area on the inside or the um middle part of the temporal lobe, the hippocampus, activates the brain areas that represent the memory so that the individual may retrieve it. And so we not only want to have it stored, we want to be able to retrieve it later.

[00:16:49]But not all of one's momentto- moment experience activate hippocample short-term memory. Only those experiences that are novel. In other words, it's new and interesting or those one intended to remember will sufficiently stimulate nerve cells in working memory. And once stimulated, these cells send electrical impulses to the hippocampus to activate short-term memory and retrieve the experience.

[00:17:20]Long-term memory lasts a lifetime. that is if you don't get ECT as mentioned uh the other day electrocombulsive therapy for depression which is still being utilized at alarming rates today because traditional medicine fails so so often there's treatment resistant depression and the therapies that are commonly available fail and so they're going right to ECT not recognizing that there's a whole lot better ways and a whole bigger toolbox to help people with depression and anxiety. Uh we have not uh to my knowledge ever had an individual come to our program um that needed ECT after that. Many have been referred to ECT and then they found our program because they didn't want to have to do that. But if you're not having induced seizures, your long-term memory should last a lifetime.

[00:18:17]And of course, this is stored in multiple areas of the brain. Now, as you get older and you're not utilizing it, you may have some difficulty in retrieving it. But as you start stimulating that portion of the brain, it can start coming back. For instance, I hadn't played um I'm not a great piano player. Um unfortunately, I I'll partially blame my parents for that. Uh, I was number five and they were tired of getting the first four to practice [snorts] and they were pretty busy as well. And so when our music teacher left the street who taught me piano at age 11, I quit lessons and I went out and played baseball and didn't have any interest in piano. Now, of course, I wish uh that were the opposite, but you know, I played things like Moonlight Sonata, and I had actually memorized it in age 11.

[00:19:20]And so now, in uh my 60s, I started playing Moonlight Sonata without notes, and I could only remember the first measure or two. Then I went back and started playing it again. And then all of a sudden, measure three and four and five came to me. Then it was blank. Then I went back to the beginning again. What's happening? You're retrieving that area of that brain where that long-term memory is at. You're increasing that circulation. and sitting down for about 45 minutes, I finally was able to complete the whole Moonlight Sonata without getting my music out from more than 40 plus years earlier. So, memories like that um will last a lifetime. It's just um the retrieving aspect that's important.

[00:20:17]So, once mild cognitive impairment is diagnosed, it's time be to begin an individualized workup. So if you're not doing so well on that MCI memory test, it's uh a time to be serious about it.

[00:20:32]Now this is one of the interesting things of dementia. You know, we see a lot of individuals, I have a whole another talk on this uh with brain fog.

[00:20:42]Brain fog are individuals who are having problems with their memory, but it's not dementia.

[00:20:50]And this is one of the clues that it may not be dementia. And that is the person will come to me very worried about their memory loss and can give ex meticulous details about how they didn't remember something uh and be very worried about it. Now there's things that we can do about brain fog. They should be worried. their brain can do better than that. Um, but the typical dementia patient minimizes their memory loss. So when someone points it out, it's not affecting me, it's no big deal, I'm getting older, and they'll tend to minimize um that memory loss. And so it's important for the individual to recognize it's happening.

[00:21:41]It's happening. We need to do something about it and we should not minimize it.

[00:21:47]So a personalized treatment plan is then developed for arresting the progression of the disease and in most cases possibly improving the memory.

[00:21:58]And of course our intelligence has a lot to do with our memory. What is intelligence?

[00:22:04]Your IQ is your ability to learn, retain and apply knowledge. And of course this is very important. And by the way longevity has been found to be related to your IQ.

[00:22:16]And so this is one of the reasons for optimizing your brain. There's several reasons why this is the case, but for instance, a study showed the higher your your IQ at age 10, the more likely you're going to become a vegetarian by the time you're 30.

[00:22:35]Now, why is that the case? Because you have the ability to learn, retain, and what else? Apply the knowledge. And so smart people learn, retain, and apply things that are going to help their quality of life and their quantity of life. And they're going to apply that knowledge. So the next time you sit down at a restaurant with some newly found friends that don't know about your diet and they see that you're ordering vegetarian, they're often going to ask, "Oh, I see you're not ordering what we're ordering. Are you vegetarian?" And if you say yes, you know what the next question is?

[00:23:14]Why are you a vegetarian? Well, as a result of that study, you can just say high IQ.

[00:23:23]That might show some low emotional intelligence. However, so hopefully you realize that was supposed to be a joke.

[00:23:32]So, uh, as you age, as mentioned, physically you'll slow down. Your strength will it will take more effort just to retain your strength. But the brain is not prone to this aging.

[00:23:43]Naturally, there are two non-modifiable risk factors that increase the risk of permanent dementia, however, or Alzheimer's disease. And one of those is age, and the other is being female. Now, males can get dementia as well, but even at the same age level, males are less likely to experience dementia than females.

[00:24:11]The risk factors that are modifiable, however, are many. If you have diabetes and it's not controlled, far more likely to develop dementia. By the way, you're also more likely to develop depression. Sometimes it's called diopression because when you're insulin resistant, you have trouble getting those uh right nutrients into the brain. Obesity also significantly increases the risk for dementia. High blood pressure. There's a whole lot of people that ignore their high blood pressure.

[00:24:47]Hypertension is called the what killer.

[00:24:50]Does anyone know?

[00:24:52]>> The silent killer because you have no symptoms. But that high blood pressure is shrinking your brain. It's very well known that the brain density starts to go down every year you have hypertension. In addition to that, it's destroying your kidneys. Half of the people on dialysis are there because they didn't control their blood pressure earlier in life.

[00:25:15]The blood pressure will will force you either to die or be on dialysis if it doesn't cause a stroke or a heart attack before that time. And of course, it significantly increases the risk of stroke, heart attack, and a whole lot of other diseases. So, it's a very simple thing to get your blood pressure taken.

[00:25:32]And what is the ideal blood pressure?

[00:25:36]Don't listen to your doctor on this because the doctor won't call it high blood pressure unless it's 140 over 90.

[00:25:44]Why won't he call it high blood pressure unless it's that? Because the studies show that that's the time that the benefits of medicine outweigh the risks.

[00:25:55]And so you're going to a doctor to get pharmaceuticals. And so they're not going to give you a pharmaceutical unless it's 140 over 90. But they will give it then because the quality measures are very clear that if that patient still has 140 over 90 and comes back and they're paying you in regards to quality that you're not going to get paid for that quality measure. So the doctor himself is incentivized to try to get that blood pressure less than 140 over 90. But as far as ideal blood pressure for not ever experiencing dementia or other complications of high blood pressure, the blood pressure should be less than 115 over 80.

[00:26:40]115 over 80. So if you're 130 over 80 or you're 125 over 85, that's too high and you are going to eventually get some brain shrinkage over time. So then we need to institute some things to control that blood pressure. Now I have a whole of course chapter in proof positive about how to control it naturally. 80% of people are going to be able to control their blood pressure naturally without medicines and get it less than that 115 over 80. And so we can do a lot with nutrition and lifestyle principles to get that down.

[00:27:18]Cigarette smoking also increases the risk of dementia.

[00:27:22]Depression as we mentioned increases the risk and depression now being at all-time high this is a major risk factor for the development of dementia and then physical inactivity when we become inactive significantly increases the risk of dementia. So if we just look at those six risk factors over 500,000 cases per year of Alzheimer's are completely preventable in the US.

[00:27:53]That's pretty significant. That's a half a million that we could do better on on those risk factors. But we can even do better than that because there's other risk factors that aren't as popular. These risk factors are talked about in every neurology office and dementia office. The this is commonly known. These six factors, the six risk factors for the development of memory loss. But some of these are not as well known.

[00:28:22]For instance, become a high school dropout.

[00:28:26]That greatly increases the risk of dementia later on. The more highly educated you are, the more you're utilizing your mind when you're younger.

[00:28:35]It's a protective a significant protective aspect in regards to the development of dementia.

[00:28:42]Don't graduate from college. That also increases the risk. Now, I should say if you are a high school dropout or didn't graduate from college, uh you won't definitely develop dementia. There are other things that you can do to help prevent that. And one is become a lifelong learner. Maybe come to our health evangelism and leadership training course for a semester and put your brain into work and learning lifestyle principles where you can coach others. Um, but you need to be kind of a lifelong learner um to be able to help uh prevent that. Well, we talked about becoming a couch potato. That will increase it. But it turns out the more we use screens normally getting distracted by them, the greater the risk of developing dementia.

[00:29:33]Constantly chatter text. Look up things online. Check your phone for the latest information almost constantly. Uh, be a YouTuber every day. And also studies have shown pornography does increase the risk of dementia significantly because what it's doing to the lower brain and the frontal lobe.

[00:29:53][clears throat] And then also interestingly masturbation it should be mentioned our younger society. It's it's incredible. You know in the era when I grew up if anyone was doing this it was it was equivalent to a mental illness.

[00:30:12]psycho, psycho, you know, would be yelled out when I was a teenager, uh, when this was happening. Now, this is routine among a lot of males and females and it's having tremendous adverse mental health consequences and physical health consequences.

[00:30:33]As Stuart Brody says from University of California, San Diego and other researchers, masturbation is always unhealthy.

[00:30:42]And we could go into all the reasons for that, but one of the things is it's going to increase your risk of dementia.

[00:30:49]And then don't try to memorize anything.

[00:30:51]If you need to know something, just Google it or look it up. By the way, it's more important, it is very important for our younger people to memorize their memory verses. But I would encourage you in your Sabbath school lessons, completely memorize that memory verse. Have it be a weekly experience. It's actually going to help protect you and and help that memory over time.

[00:31:13]Eating lots of sugar. Sugar does not come out on top at all when it comes to dementia.

[00:31:19]Eating high cholesterol foods with a lot of saturated fat. That's going to increase the risk as we'll talk about uh maybe in the next hour because that also has to do with depression.

[00:31:30]and eat [clears throat] lots of salt. It turns out too much sodium also increases your risk of dementia. Of course, it also increases your risk of hypertension.

[00:31:40]And uh, of course, smoking marijuana also increases the risk of dementia significantly and alcohol also increases the risk even in smaller amounts.

[00:31:56]So, I know I don't expect you to memorize all these things, but you might be a physician. And nothing compares to a good history and physical and serum workup. So, this is what I order on virtually everyone of my um early dementia patients because I want to optimize these things. Um but let's talk about some of the things that can actually help prevent the progression or even help. Anthocyanins have been shown to be very helpful. These are fruits and vegetables with the blue purple pigment.

[00:32:33]And anthocyanins cross the bloodb brain barrier. There was an interesting study.

[00:32:38]I know it's kind of morbid how some of these studies are done, but they have done studies on individuals who've eaten blueberries or blackberries for breakfast and then got into an automobile accident and died. and had an autopsy done and they will see the blue hue in their hippocampus of their temporal lobe. The anthocyanins have already gotten in and started to protect those areas of memory.

[00:33:09]So they cross the bloodb brain barrier and they go straight to the learning and memory centers in the brain. Blueberry supplementation. It's kind of interesting the words that are used by the researchers, but blueberry supplementation improves memory in older human adults.

[00:33:25]And of course, you also get this benefit from that Concord grape that also has anthocyanins. It's been shown to improve verbal learning. And of course, one of the arguments, I mentioned it the other day, one of the arguments of individuals is that are the health professionals, where is the double-blinded placeboc controlled trial on Concord grapes?

[00:33:53]Well, how can you come up with a placebo that looks like a Concord grape and tastes like a Concord grape and has the same texture but doesn't have any Concord grape in it? Well, you can't really do it. But they actually, and of course, the studies showed significant benefit. You don't have to have a randomized double blind control trial, particularly on natural substances. But they're putting a a um a standard that should be used for pharmaceuticals.

[00:34:23]We should do double-blinded placebo control trial on pharmaceuticals. and they are uh actually trying to apply that to natural things where you can't ever develop a placebo to do that and then criticize all of the research in that area. But some smart people actually came up with a placebo. What did they do? Concord grape juice contrasted with grape Kool-Aid that was matched to taste it the the same even though one was Kool-Aid and the other was Concord grape juice. Significant benefit in those consuming the grape juice compared to the grape Kool-Aid mix to match the taste. They had increased neural activation in the cortical regions as well. So that's the frontal lobe regions. The nurses uh Harvard population-based health study of well over 100,000 nurses took a look at blueberries and strawberries. They found that blueberries and strawberries improve memory and decrease cognitive decline in older women. And for those who were consuming them on a regular basis, it delayed the onset of memory loss by two and a half years. How much did they have to eat in order to delay it? just one serving a week of blueberries and two servings a week of strawberries.

[00:35:47][snorts] So, not a lot uh can make a big difference. But what if you were doing this more on a daily basis?

[00:35:57]We have uh developed a memory um supplement that has four different um uh ingredients in it that have been shown in randomized controlled trials to significantly help memory and focus.

[00:36:16]Uh this is a wild blueberry extract. It turns out the smaller the blueberries and the more wild they are, the better they help.

[00:36:24]uh and also a a French uh grape extract increase in 36% in cognitive performance 90 minutes after supplementation. People will talk about how their self-control improves, their focus improves.

[00:36:41]Twothirds of students who take it actually improve their focus and concentration.

[00:36:47]Uh we've put this in a supplement called focus. We had a a medical student, I don't know him, but I know friends of his um who came to our last emotional intelligence summit and showed me his dean's letter.

[00:37:05]He had failed his first year of medical school, had to repeat it. And when you fail, there's a pretty high likelihood you're going to fail it again. They allow you to remediate, but it's like you just don't have the brain for this.

[00:37:19]and you know, you're going to have to do either something very differently, but even if you do it differently, um, you're probably not going to be successful.

[00:37:28]Um, and, uh, he took two of our supplements. He just saw them marketed online. And he took brain and focus.

[00:37:37][snorts] And he said he was studying very hard the first year as well, but that was the only thing he changed. And the dean had sent him a letter. We've never seen someone who failed the first year who's now the top of the class the next year.

[00:37:54]And uh and so we have a number of um students that are taking advantage of the natural ingredients in focus. Don't have them use aderall. I tell you there's a lot of medical students using aderall. They're using meth in a pill called vivance. That's basically the same as methamphetamine in a pill to [clears throat] try to stimulate their brain to be able to focus and learn more things.

[00:38:16]uh all sorts of drugs are being utilized by medical students around the nation.

[00:38:21]And of course, that's short-term gain, long-term problems. There's natural things they can do to significantly improve their memory. Short-term memory improved by 60%. Oh, by the way, I skipped that one. In the elderly, it improves long-term memory to 10 years younger after six months of continuous use. So, it can back up the memory to the way it was 10 years earlier in some ways.

[00:38:45]accuracy, working memory, and attention improved by 39%.

[00:38:50]And these, as mentioned, are double blind placeboc control trials. Another thing that's very important as we age is getting enough omega-3.

[00:39:00]Now, these are the foods high in omega-3. Omega-3 is short in most Americans diet. They're high in omega6, but not omega-3. You can see flax seed, chia, walnuts, hemp. Those are the top four. But even broccoli has omega-3.

[00:39:18]Spinach has omega-3. Whole wheat, by the way, if you're eating refined wheat, refined grain, which most people are eating, no omega-3. And you're not getting those healthy amino acids. It'd be better for you not to eat than eating refined grains. But wheat is actually a healthy food for the brain. Don't believe all these people that say you should not eat wheat. Uh that's true for about 4% of the population that may be sensitive to it in some way, shape or form. But for 96% of us, we can eat wheat. And whole wheat is very healthy.

[00:39:51]It has a lot of B vitamins, has glutamine, uh it has methionine. These are all things that are going to help us with our brain health. And then vitamin C being a high antioxidant also is pretty high. By the way, uh my youngest son is a third-year medical student at Lom Melinda. He got married last year, so he had to rent a house.

[00:40:15]And the house he has has a lot of palo trees. And notice that has more vitamin C than oranges. Although uh oranges are not a bad source either, 96 milligrams per cup. But a pomelo 371 milligrams. Guavas and OC cherries are higher. But back to omega-3. Double blind randomized interventional study provided first time evidence that longchain omega-3s. Now what you're getting in the foods I just mentioned are mediumchain omega-3s. Mediumchains ALA have to be converted to longchain.

[00:40:55]And some people have the ability to do that. Others do not very effectively.

[00:41:04]But the longchain omega-3s exert positive effects on brain functions in healthy older adults. A significant improvement in executive function after 6 and a half months of supplementation.

[00:41:15]Significantly less brain shrinkage compared to controls.

[00:41:23]This kind of gray matter shrinkage in the placebo might be considered just normal brain aging, but it was significantly slowed by not happening at all in those that were supplementing with the high chain omega-3s. The research also described changes in the white matter of the brain, increased fractional anisttropy, decreases in mean and radial diffusivity which are associated with greater structural integrity. So that means the brain does not shrink. So we like to look at people's omega-3 index. This would be another thing that we could order if they have dementia. And that is the measure of EPA and DHA. Those are the two longchain omega-3s in red blood cell membranes expressed as a percentage of total fatty acids which indicates your body's omega-3 status.

[00:42:14]Below 4% has been shown to be suboptimal. your brain is going to start shrinking and aging a lot quicker. Four to eight% is considered good and above 8% is considered optimal. The Framingham study found what appears to be a threshold value of an omega-3 index of 4.4.

[00:42:37]Having more or more than 4.4 4 didn't seem to matter so much, but having less was associated with accelerated brain loss equivalent to about an extra two years of brain aging, which comes out to be a teaspoon less of brain matter uh every year. Another study showed those with high omega-3 levels don't shrink their brains on MRI eight years later.

[00:43:01]The problem is that people who don't eat fish may be under 4.4 four. And nearly twothirds of vegans may fall below 4.0, suggesting a substantial number of vegans have an omega-3 status associated with accelerated brain aging. And this is actually showing up in the new Adventist Health Study. There are those that are normally very healthy individuals. They're not getting heart disease or cancer, but they're getting dementia at higher rates. And it the big question is why as a plant-based vegetarian am I getting dementia? And this could well be the answer. The average American is about 4.5. Though if we age and gender match with the vegans, ironically, the omnivores do just as bad. But we want to do better than the omnivores. Phase two of the study gave algae derived EPA and DHA. By the way, that's where the fish get it from. They don't make it themselves. It's not part of their manufacturing plant. So, they have to get it from the plants of the waters. To those eating vegan diets with levels under 4.0 and about 250 milligrams a day took them from an average of 3.1 over the threshold to 4.8 within four months.

[00:44:22]Dr. Michael Greger, I know one of you uh watch him on nutritionfacts.org. He's got a lot of good peer-reviewed research. If you want to know things about disease and nutrition, Gregor would be a good source to go to from his nutrition facts. But he asked the question, should vegans take DHA to preserve brain function? And he said, this is why I recommend everyone considering eating a plant-based diet along with contaminant free EPA and DHA.

[00:44:49]Why does he say contaminate free?

[00:44:51]Because fish are contaminated with mercury that's going to hurt your brain.

[00:44:57]You can't find a mercuryfree fish anywhere. In fact, you can just predict someone's mercury level just based on how much fish they're eating. And so fish is not the answer.

[00:45:08]But we want contaminate free EPA and DHA. That means getting it from the algae.

[00:45:14]Omega-3 levels associated with brain preservation while minimizing exposure to toxic pollutants.

[00:45:21]And so, um, with all this research, and of course, I'm getting older as well, I actually take a supplement called Vegan Omega. We actually found one that has the amount of DHA that's been shown to improve your memory uh, within six months of taking it. it'll improve it um significantly and it is uh you can get the amount in just two capsules. Most of the others to get nine you need 900 milligrams of DHA in order to get that amount and most of the others are having to take all sorts of capsules and everything. So it's pretty low cost uh compared to getting you know your mercury free fish oil which is never mercury free. There's something called Lovesa. It'll cost you $240 a month.

[00:46:10]It's fish oil that they patented the mercury removal process. It removes over 90% of the mercury, but it still has more mercury than getting it from the plants of the waters by far. And so, and it's far less expensive um to get it that way. Another agent that's been shown to improve memory is bakopa.

[00:46:31]It's one of the best studied noatropic herbs available. Has been the subject of numerous positive human clinical trials.

[00:46:38]The majority of which are randomized, double-blinded, and placeboc controlled.

[00:46:42]500 articles now on bopa.

[00:46:46]And it is has been shown to improve memory acquisition and retention among middle-aged and senior adults. It improves delayed recall memory and reaction time among seniors. It improves spatial working memory accuracy and healthy volunteers. And it improves verbal memory among middle-aged and senior adults. And it increases learning rate and information processing speed among healthy adults aged 18 to 60. And it improves mental control, logical memory, and learning in people with age associated memory impairment. But interestingly, it's also been studied in the younger generation, 4 to 18 year olds with ADHD.

[00:47:26]It enhances their self-control and attention while reducing their restlessness. It boosts learning and memory in children requiring an individual education plan. So, it's good for those that are need to be in special ed because of the way their brain is not working. 93% improvement in restlessness. 89% improvement in self-control.

[00:47:51]one of our college students who actually works in our media department at Weimar uh has had a lifelong issue with ADHD and he just started this is the second ingredient we put in our supplement focus. So it's the the wild blueberry extract, French grape extract and bakcopa.

[00:48:11]and he says 90 minutes after I take it, I can totally focus and I have self-control and I'm not able to be distracted. And um and notices that. So 89% improvement in self-control. That's pretty big. 78% improvement in learning problems, 52% in psychiatric problems, and 26% improvement in logical uh verbal memory. 23% improvement in working memory and short-term uh verbal uh memory. and a 17% improvement in visual memory.

[00:48:47]Uh, bakopa is a green that's actually um grown in places like Bangladesh and India. It's in a very moist environment and it's very important that that bakopa uh because if it's a moist environment, if it's not taken care of well, there can be some fungus associated with it.

[00:49:10]So, bakcopa is very potent, but we get it from a source that is uh fungal free and uh and that um is the way you would want to get um your bakoup up. Then this substance, we talked about it the other day.

[00:49:28]What is this?

[00:49:31]The red stem is saffron.

[00:49:35]Saffron worked as well as the leading drug in treating Alzheimer's without the side effects. It inhibits the amaloid beta protein development. Saffron at 30 milligrams daily has shown statistically significant improvement in the mini mental status exam. By the time the MSSE shows up as being problematic, you know you have advanced Alzheimer's, but it will actually improve your mini mental status exam score compared to placebo.

[00:50:04]And it also improved those with mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease. And it's demonstrated non-inferiority to denapil and mammentene. Those are the two drugs that you're probably on if you've been diagnosed with dementia by a neurologist.

[00:50:21]So dasil is apt and mantene is nmena.

[00:50:27]And it showed it actually it showed it to be superior but the actual outcome was to say it's non-inferior. In other words, saffron was actually better than the two leading drugs combined uh in the Alzheimer's. Now it's working differently. You can take it with those other drugs. Um so it's not an eitheror situation. But of course the saffron doesn't have any of those side effects.

[00:50:54]A donas pill you can get nausea. uh you can get insomnia and other things.

[00:50:59]Another natural substance is citicoline.

[00:51:03]Citicoline combined with standard dementia treatments improve the many metal status exam by uh 0.5 to 1.4 1.5 points over 6 to 12 months compared to standard treatment alone. And then another agent that is surfacing that's natural is hooperine A. Hooperine A works in the same mechanism that donasapil does. It's a natural antiolonsterase inhibitor which allows the acetil choline to stay around longer. Acetilchine is used extensively in memory. A Cochran review found a weighted mean difference of 2.81 points on the mini metal SAS exam favoring hooperine a over placebo. And by the way, Donasapil only gets a half a point. And so this was like four times more potent than dasopil in helping.

[00:51:59]Meta analysis confirmed significant mini metal status exam improvements at 8, 12 and 16 weeks of treatment. And another metaanalysis reported similar findings with longer treatment durations associated with greater cognitive benefits.

[00:52:14]Then this is exciting research on near infrared photobiomodulation 2023 randomized pilot study of 20 mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease patients 12 weeks of near infrared light treatment and notice the nanometer wavelength there. This is you can't see infrared. It's below the spectrum, but it has to be 800 nanometers or 1,000 nanometers or combined. Near infrared is anywhere between 680 to 2500 nanometers.

[00:52:49]But these are the nanometers that were used resulted in a mean mental status improvement of 4.4 points in the treatment group versus less than 1.0 know with the leading drug denpasil.

[00:53:04]So 4.4 is pretty amazing in regards to improvement on the mini mental status exam. So the brains are working a lot better. Where is infrared naturally?

[00:53:18]It's from the sun. You can get as long as there's not clouds. It doesn't go through clouds very well, but you can get near infrared from sun up to sun down when there's not clouds out there.

[00:53:31]And it actually penetrates the skull the same length as your gray matter. That's where all the mitochondria are at. And what is it doing? It's actually increasing the intracellular melatonin so that your mitochondria do not burn out in the gray matter which is where we want to have that u that great memory.

[00:53:54]So being outdoors it's very important.

[00:53:58]Ellen White told us this as well. He said it's it's even far more important for the aged to get plenty of sunlight.

[00:54:05]Uh and so being outdoors is critically important. And it you don't need to necessarily be out there that long um either. Studies are showing and you know even as little as a half hour a day is important or 15 minutes twice a day. Uh but um you know if you're getting up to an hour that's pretty good as well. So 57% of treated patients showed improvements greater than four points uh compared to only 14% of controls. And they were doing this with one of those helmets that has near infrared. Another study showed significant improvement as well. And then studies on dementia. I'm running out of time, so I'm not going to necessarily go into all of those studies, but they can start to have an effect within 14 to 21 days of treatment.

[00:54:56]Zinc is also important in regards to overall mental health and traumatic brain injury also increases your risk of dementia. This is why we need to protect our brains from trauma. Omega-3s have been shown to really help protect the brain post-t trauma as well as infrared light. So, anyone who's had a traumatic brain injury, I'm putting them on the omega-3 supplements. And I'm also making sure that they get outside or have the infrared light.

[00:55:30]Other issues or supplements that can be helpful. Uh we have them listed here.

[00:55:35]DMAE is also in our focus supplement uh and anacetilcines and been also shown to help prevent the progression of Alzheimer's.

[00:55:47]I um uh was going to give you a couple of case reports on how amazing a difference it can be when we get people on the right program, but I see I'm out of those case reports. So, I'm just going to talk In closing on two examples, um, one is JTO Malloi. I met him in Batswana when I was speaking to the legislature and the government there.

[00:56:20]They told me about him. He was 114 years old.

[00:56:28]I met his daughter who was 87.

[00:56:31]So her father was still living. She's 87.

[00:56:36]His pattern early to bed, early to rise.

[00:56:39]We didn't talk about that, but you make double the melatonin at night when you go to bed early.

[00:56:45]He was in bed before 8:00 p.m. He would get up at 3:00 a.m. He said he slept well every night. He was vegetarian. He only ate two meals a day. Another thing that helps protect your brain is to not eat in the evening. You go into ketosis.

[00:57:00]that actually helps the brain derived neurotrophic factor, a brain fertilizer that actually helps protect your brain from deterioration.

[00:57:10]He worked 11 hours a day outside at 114.

[00:57:15]His back was straight and he worked in the agricultural industry. He had his own farm and he would get up early in the morning to feed his workers. He would cook them a plant-based diet. He was mentally sharp, no dementia at 114.

[00:57:33]And I saw him teach his weekly Sabbath school class.

[00:57:37]And the only aging part I could see other than how he looked was that his hearing required him to put his hand like this when others were commenting so he could hear what they were saying. Uh but he didn't have any hearing aids. And he was also a Pathfinder leader of his local church at 114. You can see him there in his Pathfinder leader. Another one I'd like to mention is my friend John Sharfenberg.

[00:58:05]He's 102.

[00:58:07]He's in Northern California. He travels the world by himself giving health lectures.

[00:58:14]He's a physician and a nutritionist, a Harvard trained nutritionist.

[00:58:18]and uh his family had issues with memory in their 80s, his brothers and other family members. And he thinks the big difference for him, he said the big difference is when I was in my started in my 50s, I made sure I was going to be outdoors a significant portion of the time. He was doing his fruit trees. He was uh doing a lot of outside work and he said the other and my other relatives were indoors. The other thing he was very um particular about was not eating in the evening. He was a two meal a day. I went to his 100th birthday party. Chef AJ, who's not a Seventh Day Adventist, but she is a vegan cook and famous nationwide. Um she has programs talking about health all the time. Chef AJ wanted to have his hundth birthday party and advertise it on her show. And so she had this late afternoon. I got there about 5:00. Everyone was eating. John Sharpenberg was not eating at his own 100th birthday celebration. He says, "I haven't ate supper for decades. I'm not going to start now." At age 100, he remembers everything. He'll remember who he met that day. He remembers all the studies. His mind is sharp. It hasn't declined at all. And he's 102 and going strong. Plant-based vegetarian and uh a uh a student where he's been a lifelong learner as well, but also very intentional about getting outside and not eating that evening meal. So I think the human brain is actually more capable for longer than what anyone quite realizes.

[01:00:16]And if we would put new start I consider these guys both Mr. New start nutrition exercise enough water they live a temperate lifestyle that's pretty simple fresh air rest and that sunlight is very important as well. We're finding out sunlight is far more important than we ever realize. It's not just vitamin D that's helping us. It's the infrared.

[01:00:39]What a difference it can make. And when you add that trust factor with God and having that presence of the Lord with you, that [clears throat] is only going to help in regards to all of the other modalities as well. So, uh hopefully you have found this encouraging and uh uh God bless you. We look forward for our last seminar coming up in a few minutes.

[01:01:02]And I'll turn it over to Pastor Joel.

[01:01:10]>> [applause] >> All right. Thank you, Dr. Nedley. Let's have a closing prayer. Our father in heaven, I want to thank you for the words that we were able to hear. Help us to implement them, put them into practice, improve our our uh our health so we can improve our lives and our witness for you. And this is our prayer in Jesus name. Amen. All right.

[01:01:30]Afternoon seminars begin in about 15 minutes at 2:45. Um you have the lists here in your program. Hopefully you all have been blessed already by the various seminars that are happening around campus. Uh one of which is happening here. This is the final one for Dr. Dedley this afternoon at 245. Nutrition in the brain is his topic and he's going to be uh sharing that here at 2:45.

[01:01:52]Otherwise the rest of seminars are around campus location is in here. And uh I will see you all tonight at 6:45.

[01:02:00]Have a wonderful afternoon.