welcome to the organic green doctor blog

i am a family physician who was diagnosed with
early mild cognitive impairment(mci) amnestic type on december 21, 2010
this is a precursor to alzheimers disease
because of this diagnosis i have opted to stop practicing medicine
this blog will be about my journey with this disease
please feel free to follow me along this path
i will continue blogging on organic gardening, green living,
solar power, rainwater collection, and healthy living
i will blog on these plus other things noted to be interesting

Friday, March 8, 2013

granny needs to facebook

GRANNY NEEDS TO FACEBOOK
after i read an article by alexis blue from the university of arizona
i felt good about my wife shes not getting dementia when she
gets older

if you are a facebook friend of my wife she you know that
she likes to like things and is a regular visitor to facebook

heck i hear her laughing at a video or telling me to read this
article all the time
sometimes its when ive dosed off in my chair while watching tv
at night
i dont get mad cause now i know its good for her


in a study done by graduate student janelle wohltmann elderly
people in the study who began using facebook showed a 25%
increase in cognitive functioning based on administered tests

could it be that mark zuckerberg who developed facebook
may have found a treatment for early cognitive decline in
people especially in the elderly

one of the things thats recommended for people to prevent?
or modify the development of dementia is to stay as cognitively
active as you can be

eg i have mild cognitive impairment amnestic type and may have
alzheimers disease
i write this blog 5 days a week
eg for today i read three articles to do this blog
went to the alzheimers association website to look up information and
reviewed notes on a presentation im doing in april
then i used that information to write this blog

i will post it on facebook twitter and email it out
i later will interact with people from the comment section from facebook
twitter and from email

each day i do this and it requires a lot of cognitive functioning and
cognitive exercise if you will to do this blog

all this activity may be helping to slow the progression of symptoms some

facebooking in the elderly (now thats not me)
may be helpful because of all the steps thats required to post something
read some about the post then interact with those who respond to the
post

its the use it or lose it theory of the decline in the elderly of their memory
facebooking seems to work better than those games that are marketed
to the elderly since facebooking requires more cognition to participate

those games may become boring and monotonous and not be as
beneficial

the average age in this study was 79
so watch out for those new grannys getting on facebook
maybe encourage yours to join up
and to stay mentally active

the organicgreen doctor

3 comments:

  1. When my mother in law came to live with us, two years ago, I introduced her to facebook. She reconnected with extended family in Kentucky after many years of no contact with them at all. She also keeps in touch with her grandchildren and has hours of human contact and interaction that would otherwise be missing from her life. I agree with you. I see it doing her immense good.

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  2. I'm glad that social media is getting a positive spin! I feel so much more connected to people from all parts of my past (for us military brats, that was almost impossible before social media). Makes me happy that my dad and uncle are both on FB!

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  3. I have a great video for you and your wife. I will be posting it on your facebook wall.

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