This is the 79th instalment in a series on dementia, including the research into its causes and treatment, advice for carers, and stories of hope.
As the new year approaches, four doctors with a special interest in brain health describe the best ways to start safeguarding brain health now to prevent or delay the onset of dementia later.
They also share the steps they are taking now to protect their own brain health.
Just move
Dr David Ward is a research fellow in ageing and geriatric medicine at the University of Queensland in Australia. As a dementia researcher entering mid-life, he says he is “acutely aware that it is the life phase in which risk factors begin to creep up on you”.
Those risk factors – which include higher blood pressure, weight gain and loss of strength – can contribute to faster ageing and make the brain less resilient to the changes in that organ that pose a dementia risk.
Dr David Ward is a research fellow at the University of Queensland in Australia. Mid-life, he says, is the phase in which risk factors for dementia “begin to creep up on you”. Photo: Dr David WardWard’s brain-health resolution for 2026 is to move “purposefully”. Regular physical activity, he says, “is the most reliable way we have of tackling the cluster of cardiometabolic issues and mood-related risk factors that drive both frailty and dementia”.
Exercise has been described as the most “transformative” thing we can do for brain health.