Everyone has heard of diabetes and Alzheimer's disease, but few know that there are some experts who believe that the two diseases are intertwined. Some are even calling Alzheimer's the “diabetes of the brain”.
How is this connection made? We know that insulin is important for many parts of the body, including organs, as well as the brain. We know that not only does insulin help in our ability to learn and remember things, but learning actually elevates insulin levels. We also know that not enough insulin, or a body not responding correctly to insulin, leads to diabetes.
So it really came to no surprise that recent research suggested that insulin abnormalities have been connected with certain types of neurodegenerative diseases. Among them are Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer's disease.
According to one study in particular, insulin located in the brain is directly connected to insulin located elsewhere in the body. For this reason, it appears that diabetics are more than twice as likely to also develop Alzheimer's.
Scientists believe that since low levels of insulin in the body are responsible for creating type 2 diabetes, that is makes sense that low levels of insulin in the brain could point to degenerative disorders of the brain.
To substantiate this theory, experts have compared insulin levels in the brains of Alzheimer's patients to levels in healthy brains. In the healthy brains, neural levels of insulin that were directly related to learning and memory were four times as much as levels in the Alzheimer's brains.
Some experts believe that treatments for Alzheimer's disease might work to boost insulin levels within the brain. They also suggest that it could even fight off the effects of insulin resistance.
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