The Age-Proof Brain – by Dr. Marc Milstein
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Biological aging is not truly just one thing, but rather the amalgam of many things intersecting—and most of them are modifiable. The cells of your body neither know nor care how many times you have flown around the sun; they just respond to the stimuli they’re given.
Which is what fuels this book. The idea is to have a brain that is less-assailed by the things that would make it age, and more rejuvenated by the things that can make it biologically younger.
Dr. Milstein doesn’t neglect the rest of the body, and indeed notes the brain’s connections with the immune system, the heart, the gut, and more. But everything in this book is done with the brain in mind and its good health as the top priority outcome of all the things he advises.
On which note, yes, there is plenty of practical, implementable advice here. For a book that is consistently full of study paper citations, he does take care to make everything useful to the reader, and makes everything as easy as possible for the layperson along the way.
Bottom line: if you would like your brain to age less, this is an excellent, very evidence-based, guidebook.
Click here to check out The Age-Proof Brain, and age-proof your brain!
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Do CBD Gummies Work?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small
❝I take CBD gummies. I don’t know if they are worth buying. Can you find a study on the effectiveness of gummies❞
If you take them, and you’re not sure whether they’re worth it, then it sounds like you’re not getting any observable benefit from them?
If so, that would seem to answer your question, since presumably the reason that you are taking them is for relaxation and/or pain relief, so if you’re not getting the results you want, then no, they are not worth it.
However! CBD gummies are an incredibly diverse and not-well-studied product, so far, given the relative novelty of their legality. By diverse we mean, they’re not well-standardized.
In other words: the CBD gummies you get could be completely unlike CBD gummies from a different source.
CBD itself (i.e. in forms other than just gummies, and mostly as oil) has been studied somewhat better, and we did a main feature on it here:
And while we’re at it:
Cannabis Myths vs Reality ← This one is about cannabis products in general, and includes discussion of THC content and effects, which might not be so relevant to you, but may to some readers.
Companies selling CBD and CBD gummies may make bold claims that are not yet backed by science, so if you are buying them for those reasons, you might want to be aware:
Selling cannabidiol products in Canada: a framing analysis of advertising claims by online retailers
One thing that we would add is that even though CBD is generally recognized as safe, it is possible to overdose on CBD gummies, so do watch your limits:
A Case of Toxicity from Cannabidiol Gummy Ingestion
Take care!
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Debate over tongue tie procedures in babies continues. Here’s why it can be beneficial for some infants
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There is increasing media interest about surgical procedures on new babies for tongue tie. Some hail it as a miracle cure, others view it as barbaric treatment, though adverse outcomes are rare.
Tongue tie occurs when the tissue under the tongue is attached to the lower gum or floor of the mouth in a way that can restrict the movement or range of the tongue. This can impact early breastfeeding in babies. It affects an estimated 8% of children under one year of age.
While there has been an increase in tongue tie releases (also called division or frenotomy), it’s important to keep this in perspective relative to the increase in breastfeeding rates.
The World Health Organization recommends exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months of life, with breastfeeding recommended into the second year of life and beyond for the health of mother and baby as well as optimal growth. Global rates of breastfeeding infants for the first six months have increased from 38% to 48% over the past decade. So, it is not surprising there is also an increase in the number of babies being referred globally with breastfeeding challenges and potential tongue tie.
An Australian study published in 2023 showed that despite a 25% increase in referrals for tongue tie division between 2014 and 2018, there was no increase in the number of tongue tie divisions performed. Tongue tie surgery rates increased in Australia in the decade from 2006 to 2016 (from 1.22 per 1,000 population to 6.35) for 0 to 4 year olds. There is no data on surgery rates in Australia over the last eight years.
Tongue tie division isn’t always appropriate but it can make a big difference to the babies who need it. More referrals doesn’t necessarily mean more procedures are performed.
chomplearn/Shutterstock How tongue tie can affect babies
When tongue tie (ankyloglossia) restricts the movement of the tongue, it can make it more difficult for a baby to latch onto the mother’s breast and painlessly breastfeed.
Earlier this month, the International Consortium of oral Ankylofrenula Professionals released a tongue tie position statement and practice guideline. Written by a range of health professionals, the guidelines define tongue tie as a functional diagnosis that can impact breastfeeding, eating, drinking and speech. The guidelines provide health professionals and families with information on the assessment and management of tongue tie.
Tongue tie release has been shown to improve latch during breastfeeding, reduce nipple pain and improve breast and bottle feeding. Early assessment and treatment are important to help mothers breastfeed for longer and address any potential functional problems.
The frenulum is a band of tissue under the tongue that is attached to the gumline base of the mouth. Akkalak Aiempradit/Shutterstock Where to get advice
If feeding isn’t going well, it may cause pain for the mother or there may be signs the baby isn’t attaching properly to the breast or not getting enough milk. Parents can seek skilled help and assessment from a certified lactation consultant or International Board-Certified Lactation Consultant who can be found via online registry.
Alternatively, a health professional with training and skills in tongue tie assessment and division can assist families. This may include a doctor, midwife, speech pathologist or dentist with extended skills, training and experience in treating babies with tongue tie.
When access to advice or treatment is delayed, it can lead to unnecessary supplementation with bottle feeds, early weaning from breastfeeding and increased parental anxiety.
Getting a tongue tie assessment
During assessment, a qualified health professional will collect a thorough case history, including pregnancy and birth details, do a structural and functional assessment, and conduct a comprehensive breastfeeding or feeding assessment.
They will view and thoroughly examine the mouth, including the tongue’s movement and lift. The appearance of where the tissue attaches to the underside of the tongue, the ability of the tongue to move and how the baby can suck also needs to be properly assessed.
Treatment decisions should focus on the concerns of the mother and baby and the impact of current feeding issues. Tongue tie division as a baby is not recommended for the sole purpose of avoiding speech problems in later life if there are no feeding concerns for the baby.
A properly qualified lactation consultant can help with positioning and attachment. HarryKiiM Stock/Shutterstock Treatment options
The Australian Dental Association’s 2020 guidelines provide a management pathway for babies diagnosed with tongue tie.
Once feeding issues are identified and if a tongue tie is diagnosed, non-surgical management to optimise positioning, latch and education for parents should be the first-line approach.
If feeding issues persist during follow-up assessment after non-surgical management, a tongue tie division may be considered. Tongue tie release may be one option to address functional challenges associated with breastfeeding problems in babies.
There are risks associated with any procedure, including tongue tie release, such as bleeding. These risks should be discussed with the treating practitioner before conducting any laser, scissor or scalpel tongue tie procedure.
Post-release support by a certified lactation consultant or feeding specialist is necessary after a tongue tie division. A post-release treatment plan should be developed by a team of health professionals including advice and support for breastfeeding to address both the mother and baby’s individual needs.
We would like to acknowledge the contribution of Raymond J. Tseng, DDS, PhD, (Paediatric Dentist) to the writing of this article.
Sharon Smart, Lecturer and Researcher (Speech Pathology) – School of Allied Health, Curtin University; David Todd, Associate Professor, Neonatology, ANU Medical School, Australian National University, and Monica J. Hogan, PhD student, ANU School of Medicine and Psychology, Australian National University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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Sleep Through Insomnia – by Dr. Brandon Peters
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
First, what this is not: a guide to get better sleep tonight.
Rather, what it is: a guide to get better sleep in the near future (six weeks).
The way it delivers this is primarily Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I), in 6 weekly lessons, each divided into 3 activities:
- Reflection
- Education
- Setting goals
Now, all parts are important, but we’d say the biggest value here is in the education segment, in part because it helps the reader understand why the reflection is important, and how to usefully set the goals.
“Reflection” may sound quite wishy-washy, but in fact it is very science-based, with questions as prompts, which effectively amount to the “gathering data” part of science.
“Setting goals”, for its part, is intended to be a progressive, step-by-step approach to get you to where you want to be with your sleep.
The style is instructional pop-science, with everything made easy to understand. There are an abundance of scientific references for those who wish to delve further, and sometimes he does go into more neurological detail than a book written by a psychologist might (Dr. Peters being a medical doctor, board-certified in neurology and sleep medicine, and with extensive training in CBT-I).
Bottom line: if you’d like to sleep better and you have the will to commit to a 6-week program (which will not ask anything arduous of you, but you will need to show up for it and do the things), then this book can give you a much better long-term fix than telling you to change your sheets and put your phone away.
Click here to check out Sleep Through Insomnia, and sleep easy!
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Coffee, From A Blood Sugar Management Perspective
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Our favorite French biochemist (Jessie Inchauspé) is back, and this time, she’s tackling a topic near and dear to this writer’s heart: coffee ☕💕
What to consider
Depending on how you like your coffee, some or all of these may apply to you:
- Is coffee healthy? Coffee is generally healthy, reducing the risk of type 2 diabetes by improving fat burning in the liver and protecting beta cells in the pancreas.
- Does it spike blood sugars? Usually not so long as it’s black and unsweetened. Black coffee can cause small glucose spikes in some people due to stress-induced glucose release, but only if it contains caffeine.
- When is it best to drink it? Drinking coffee after breakfast, especially after a poor night’s sleep, can actually reduce glucose and insulin spikes.
- What about milk? All milks cause some glucose and insulin spikes. While oat milk is generally healthy, for blood sugar purposes unsweetened nut milks or even whole cow’s milk (but not skimmed; it needs the fat) are better options as they cause smaller spikes.
- What about sweetening? Adding sugar to coffee, especially on an empty stomach, obviously leads to large glucose spikes. Alternative sweeteners like stevia or sweet cinnamon are fine substitutes.
For more details on all of those things, plus why Kenyan coffee specifically may be the best for blood sugars, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
- The Bitter Truth About Coffee (or is it?)
- Caffeine: Cognitive Enhancer Or Brain-Wrecker?
- 10 Ways To Balance Blood Sugars
Take care!
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The Sucralose News: Scaremongering Or Serious?
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What’s the news on sucralose?
These past days the press has been abuzz with frightening tales:
- This Common Artificial Sweetener Can Break Down DNA, Scientists Warn
- Sucralose Damages DNA, Linked to Leaky Gut
- Chemical found in common sweetener damages DNA
- Chemical found in widely used sweetener breaks up DNA
- Chemical from Splenda breaks up DNA
How true and/or serious is this?
Firstly, let’s manage expectations. Pineapple juice also breaks down DNA, but is not generally considered a health risk. So let’s keep that in mind, while we look into the science.
Is sucralose as scary as pineapple juice, or is it something actually dangerous?
The new study (that sparked off these headlines)
The much-referenced study is publicly available to read in full—here it is:
You may notice that this doesn’t have quite the snappy punchiness of some of the headlines, but let’s break this down, if you’ll pardon the turn of phrase:
- Toxicological: pertaining to whether or not it has toxic qualities
- Pharmacokinetic: the science of asking, of chemicals in bodies, “where did it come from; where did it go; what could it do there; what can we know?”
- Sucralose-6-acetate: an impurity that can be found in sucralose. For perspective, the study found that the sucralose in Splenda contained “up to” 0.67% sucralose-6-acetate.
- Sucralose: a modified form of sucrose, that makes it hundreds of times sweeter, and non-caloric because the body cannot break it down so it’s treated as a dietary fiber and just passes through
- In vitro: things are happening in petri dishes, not in animals (human or otherwise), which would be called “in vivo”
- Screening assays: “we set up a very closed-parameters chemical test, to see what happens when we add this to this” ⇽ oversimplification, but this is the basic format of a screening assay
Great, now we understand the title, but what about the study?
Researchers looked primarily at the effects of sucralose-6-acetate and sucralose (together and separately) on epithelial cells (these are very simple cells that are easy to study; conveniently, they are also most of what makes up our intestinal walls). For this, they used a fancy way of replicating human intestinal walls, that’s actually quite fascinating but beyond the scope of today’s newsletter. Suffice it to say: it’s quite good, and/but has its limitations too. They also looked at some in vivo rat studies.
What they found was…
Based on samples from the rat feces (somehow this didn’t make it into the headlines), it appears that sucralose may be acetylated in the intestines. What that means is that we, if we are like the rats (definitely not a given, but a reasonable hypothesis), might convert up to 10% of sucralose into sucralose-6-acetate inside us. Iff we do, the next part of the findings become more serious.
Based on the in vitro simulations, both sucralose and sucralose-6-acetate reduced intestinal barrier integrity at least a little, but sucralose-6-acetate was the kicker when it came to most of the effects—at least, so we (reasonably!) suppose.
Basically, there’s a lot of supposition going on here but the suppositions are reasonable. That’s how science works; there’s usually little we can know for sure from a single study; it’s when more studies roll in that we start to get a more complete picture.
What was sucralose-6-acetate found to do? It increased the expression of genes associated with inflammation, oxidative stress, and cancer (granted those three things generally go together). So that’s a “this probably has this end result” supposition.
More concretely, and which most of the headlines latched onto, it was found (in vitro) to induce cytogenic damage, specifically, of the clastogenic variety (produces DNA strand breaks—so this is different than pineapple’s bromelain and DNA-helicase’s relatively harmless unzipping of genes).
The dose makes the poison
So, how much is too much and is that 0.67% something to worry about?
- Remembering the rat study, it may be more like 10% once our intestines have done their thing. Iff we’re like rats.
- But, even if it’s only 0.67%, this will still be above the “threshold of toxicological concern for genotoxicity”, of 0.15µg/person/day.
- On the other hand, the fact that these were in vitro studies is a serious limitation.
- Sometimes something is very dangerous in vitro, because it’s being put directly onto cells, whereas in vivo we may have mechanisms for dealing with that.
We won’t know for sure until we get in vivo studies in human subjects, and that may not happen any time soon, if ever, depending on the technical limitations and ethical considerations that sometimes preclude doing certain studies in humans.
Bottom line:
- The headlines are written to be scary, but aren’t wrong; their claims are fundamentally true
- What that means for us as actual humans may not be the same, however; we don’t know yet
- For now, it is probably reasonable to avoid sucralose just in case
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How To Heal And Regrow Receding Gums
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small
❝Hey Sheila – As always, your articles are superb !! So, I have a topic that I’d love you guys to discuss: green tea. I used to try + drink it years ago but I always got an allergic reaction to it. So the question I’d like answered is: Will I still get the same allergic reaction if I take the capsules ? Also, because it’s caffeinated, will taking it interfere with iron pills, other vitamins + meds ? I read that the health benefits of the decaffeinated tea/capsules are not as great as the caffeinated. Any info would be greatly appreciated !! Thanks much !!❞
Hi! I’m not Sheila, but I’ll answer this one in the first person as I’ve had a similar issue:
I found long ago that taking any kind of tea (not herbal infusions, but true teas, e.g. green tea, black tea, red tea, etc) on an empty stomach made me want to throw up. The feeling would subside within about half an hour, but I learned it was far better to circumvent it by just not taking tea on an empty stomach.
However! I take an l-theanine supplement when I wake up, to complement my morning coffee, and have never had a problem with that. Of course, my physiology is not your physiology, and this “shouldn’t” be happening to either of us in the first place, so it’s not something there’s a lot of scientific literature about, and we just have to figure out what works for us.
This last Monday I wrote (inspired in part by your query) about l-theanine supplementation, and how it doesn’t require caffeine to unlock its benefits after all, by the way. So that’s that part in order.
I can’t speak for interactions with your other supplements or medications without knowing what they are, but I’m not aware of any known issue, beyond that l-theanine will tend to give a gentler curve to the expression of some neurotransmitters. So, if for example you’re talking anything that affects that (e.g. antidepressants, antipsychotics, ADHD meds, sleepy/wakefulness meds, etc) then checking with your doctor is best.
❝Can you do something on collagen and keep use posted on pineapple, and yes love and look forward to each issue❞
Glad you’re enjoying! We did write a main feature on collagen a little while back! Here it is:
We Are Such Stuff As Fish Are Made Of
As for pineapple, there’s not a lot to keep you posted about! Pineapple’s protein-digesting, DNA-unzipping action is well-established and considered harmless (if your mouth feels weird when you eat pineapple or drink pineapple juice, this is why, by the way) because no meaningful damage was done.
For example:
- Pineapple’s bromelain action is akin to taking apart a little lego model brick by brick (easy to fix)
- Clastogenic genotoxicity is more like taking a blowtorch to the lego model (less easy to fix)
Fun fact: pineapple is good against inflammation, because of the very same enzyme!
❝I never knew anything about the l- tea. Where can I purchase it?❞
You can get it online quite easily! Here’s an example on Amazon
❝The 3 most important exercises don’t work if you can’t get on the floor. I’m 78, and have knee replacements. What about 3 best chair yoga stretches? Love your articles!❞
Here are six!
We turn the tables and ask you a question!
We’ll then talk about this tomorrow:
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