What is Brain Health and Why is Everyone Talking About it?
by Donna Spellman, MS, CDP
“Brain health is the state of the brain as it functions across cognitive, sensory, social-emotional, behavioral and motor domains, allowing a person to realize their full potential over the life course, irrespective of the presence or absence of disorders.” (World Health Organization) The health of our brain, along with our ability to adapt to stress and adversity is related to our physical health, our environment, our social connections, lifelong learning and our access to quality services. These factors pave the way to preventative and reactive strategies throughout our lives. “Optimizing brain health by addressing these determinants not only improves mental and physical health but also creates positive social and economic impacts that contribute to greater well-being and help advance society.” (World Health Organization)
Why is the health or state of our brain being talked about so often nowadays? There’s been quite a bit of research related to neuroplasticity, or in the simplest of terms, the “use it or lose it” theory. Most people, barring any neurological issues, hit their peak of learning by the age of 21-22. This stands to reason, since the first 21-22 years of our lives are most often spent in school. After that period of time, we rely on our learned skills and strategies in our occupations, hobbies, raising families, traveling the world, exploring, and going wherever life leads us. This doesn’t mean that we stop learning after the first twenty-something years of our lives, but we tend to rely on the skills that come the easiest to us and avoid the skills that are harder or we simply don’t enjoy. Circling back to the “use it or lose it” theory, we begin to stiffen (or “lose”) the areas of the brain that we don’t access (or use) as often. Consider this. Suppose you broke your leg and wore a cast immobilizing your leg for 8 weeks. When the day comes to remove the cast, your leg muscles will have become atrophied and weak. You will likely have to exercise those muscles to regain your strength and flexibility. With work, you most likely regain the strength and flexibility you had before your injury. The same goes for those areas of your brain that you haven’t used. Because they haven’t been exercised or used, they have become stiff and atrophied. But once you start using them, they become flexible, reignited and fired up. The lesson here is that our brains operate like other muscles–we have the ability to exercise our brain so that we can strengthen the areas that have been ignored or used less often over time.
Why is this important? The World Health Organization explains it like this: The human brain is the command center for the body’s nervous system and enables thoughts, memory, movement, and emotions by a complex function that is the highest product of biological evolution. The brain controls everything from breathing and hunger to emotion and movement; it interprets your senses, tells you to pull your hand away from a hot stove, and stores all your memories. But as people age, the risk of developing a form of dementia increases. Therefore, maintaining a healthy brain during one's life is the uppermost goal in pursuing overall health and longevity.
