Is Alzheimer’s Disease a “Diabetes of the Brain”?

Image: The Franklin Institute

Alzheimer’s disease, a form of dementia that currently afflicts 35 million people worldwide, could be a form of “brain diabetes”, according to a small but growing body of evidence. In a recent article in the British Guardian, and a piece by Mark Bittman in the NY Times, the case is made for a connection between insulin problems and brain damage.

Diabetes is a disease of insulin. Insulin is a hormone produced in the pancreas that enables the body’s cells to absorb glucose (sugar) from the bloodstream. In type 1 diabetes, which afflicts about 10% of people with diabetes, the pancreas does not manufacture enough insulin and thus blood sugar level skyrocket. Hence the need for insulin shots before/after every meal. In type 2 diabetes, the pancreas manufactures insulin, but the body has become resistant to it and no matter how much overtime the pancreas puts in to manufacture more, blood sugar levels continue to rise. Eventually the pancreas poops out as well. Type 2 diabetes is strongly associated as the result of poor food choices and obesity.

Unfortunately, people who have type 2 diabetes are twice as likely to contract Alzheimer’s disease as healthy folk. In autopsies of people who died from Alzheimer’s, the insulin levels in their brains were much lower than in those of a control group. This has led to the notion that perhaps the brain also manufactures insulin to absorb glucose. Glucose is required for proper brain function. According to the Guardian article:

Plenty of research still needs to be done. But, if the current indications are correct, Alzheimer’s disease could be another catastrophic impact of the junk food industry, and the worst discovered so far. Our governments, as they are in the face of all our major crises, seem to be incapable of responding.

 Another reason to eat more healthfully?