Brain Energy
The Alzheimer’s Hub of Hope has four sections: Heroes, Highlights, Headlines and Helpers/Caregivers. This post is aligned to the headlines section.
While doing my Alzheimer’s disease research, I often came across references to the Brain Energy book by Dr. Christopher Palmer. I was hesitant to read it since its focus was on the causes and treatment of general mental illnesses (e.g. depression, bipolar, schizophrenia) with AD being a secondary topic. However, I was called to jury duty which means sitting around for hours on end waiting to be selected; so I had plenty of time for reading. I might as well read the Brain Energy book. I was sure I would learn something. So I did. You can order the book from the Brain Energy site here.
Christopher M. Palmer, MD, is a Harvard psychiatrist and researcher. He is the director of the Department of Postgraduate and Continuing Education at McLean Hospital and an assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. For more than two decades, he has held leadership roles in psychiatric education at Harvard, McLean Hospital, and nationally.
What makes Dr. Palmer special is that he is highly academically credentialed AND is a practicing psychiatrist who has treated patients for multiple decades. His views are not just theoretical but include what has worked for his patients.
I’m not going to critique the book but will summarize the main points and call out how it addresses AD. Based on this, you may want to read the book yourself. I think the author did a good job of writing it for a lay person to understand (I understood most of it).
Although the author doesn’t discuss the genesis of his brain energy theory in the book, he does in his lengthy interview on the Huberman Lab1 podcast where he discusses multiple case studies.
He had a patient who was suffering with a severe mental illness for many years who wanted to loose weight. This patient was very obese, hallucinated and was very paranoid. Dr. Palmer suggested various dietary weight loss options which didn’t work and eventually suggested the ketogenic diet. Over time, not only did the patient lose weight on this diet but his mental illness drastically improved.
As Dr. Palmer investigated why the ketogenic diet reduced mental illness symptoms in this and other patients (regardless of the mental disorder) he determined that the common pathway for mental illness is the number, density and health of a person’s mitocondria. Essentially, defective and dysfunctional mitocondria is the root cause of mental illnesses. This is a new way of thinking about mental illness. Without getting into too much detail, mitocondria are components of a cell. The book has more detail if you want it.
Mitocondria are often referred to as the energy source of a cell (they do other things too) and so the book title “Brain Energy” is appropriate. Mitocondria are responsible for a person’s metabolism which is the process in which the body uses food for energy and growth.
Deficient mitocondria in number or health results in less energy in the body including the brain. He refers to the brain as being the weakest link regarding the use of energy and is the first area negatively impacted.
Since he believes mitocondria drives mental illness, it is necessary to increase their number and improve their health to treat mental illness and reduce mental health risks.
I encourage you to watch Dr. Palmer’s handiwork in this 6 minute Today Show clip. One of his patients, Matt Baszucki was diagnosed with bipolar disorder for eight years. During that time he took 29 different medications, visited 40 doctors and was told his condition was treatment resistant. Per the video, Matt’s symptoms completed subsided once Dr. Palmer put him on a keto diet (low carb, moderate protein, high fat).
How to Increase and Improve Mitocondria
The first two sections of the book provides a lot of Dr. Palmer’s analysis and support for the brain energy theory. It is a new way of thinking that needs to be explained. I’ve copied the table of contents in the last section of this post.
Section III of the book discusses the causes that result in fewer and less healthy mitocondria, as well as, how to rectify the situation. There are about 135 pages of detail discussing how to keep your mitocndria healthy if you want it. I found this article which summarizes Dr. Palmer’s top six items. It’s the Cliff Notes version. You may want to start here.
I never load up on high-carb foods.
I never take more than 2 days off from exercising.
I never get less than 7 hours of sleep a night.
I never drink alcohol.
I’m never done with self-growth.
I never lose sight of my purpose in life.
Brain Energy, The metabolic Theory of Mental Illness (27 min video)
This 27 minute video provides a good overview of the brain energy theory. I’ve included some bullet-points for those who don’t want to watch the whole video.
Mental illness correlates with obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s disease and epilepsy
People with schizophrenia are 20 times more likely to get AD by age 66 than the population in general
AD sufferers have the hallmark symptoms of schizophrenia
Mental disorders are metabolic disorders of the brain
Children with insulin resistance (a metabolic disease) are 5x more likely to have a mental illness and 3x more likely to have a psychotic illness. The metabolic problem comes first and then the mental problem
The mental health field needs to be integrated with the metabolic health field; they are one and the same and each provides feedback to the other
Mitochondria controls metabolism (metabolic health) and are the unifying link of all mental health risk factors (see the 15 minute mark)
Standard health and wellness factors like diet, sleep and exercise improve mitocondria
Ketones (from eating fat or consuming the fat in your body) stimulates mitochondria repair, creates more mitocondria and improves their density (Note that Dr. Palmer and Dr. Huberman both promote the consumption of heavy whipping cream in the Huberman Lab podcast referenced in footnote 1 below)
There is current research looking at ketones and their impact to AD sufferers
Alzheimer Specific
I listed the book’s major AD references in the section below. This will save you time if you just wanted to read what it has to say about AD.
Page 3: discusses how the brain energy theory (treatment) is being pursued for AD
Page 4: discusses connections between physical disorders (e.g. epilepsy, diabetes, heart attacks) and AD
Pages 68 - 69: correlates the risk factors for metabolic diseases with the risk factors for AD (they are the same - smoking, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and the lack of exercise). So perhaps AD is a metabolic disease. It also discusses the drastically increased likelihood of a person developing AD if they previously had a mental illness such as depression.
Page 70: goes into more detail regarding the biderectional relationship between mental illnises (including AD) and metobolic illnisess
Page 110: cognitive problems such as memory issues can be due to the reduced function of neurons (perhaps due to low brain energy)
Page 143: amyloid is associated with AD and is toxic to mitocondria and causes mitocondrial dysfunction.
Page 163: if metabolic problems occur over long periods of time, cells can shrink and die, which is found in most chronic mental disorders and Alzheimer’s.
Page 224: sleep deprived mice have higher levels of mitocondrial dysfunction and the accumulation of amyloid plaque compared to a control group.
Page 238: elevated blood glucose (sugar) plays a role in higher rates of depression and Alzheimer’s and its the mitocondria that controls the glucose levels.
Page 251: AD researchers compared results of eating a ketogenic diet to a low fat diet. The result was that the ketogenic diet participants had improvements in daily functions and quality of life. This is important since it’s very unusual for a AD suffer to show improvement from any treatment.
Brain Energy Table of Contents
Part I: Connecting the Dots
What We’re Doing Isn’t Working: Mental Health Today
What Causes Mental Illness and Why Does It Matter?
Searching for a Common Pathway
Could It All Be Related?
Part II: Brain Energy
Mental Disorders Are Metabolic Disorders
Mental States and Mental Disorders
Magnificent Mitochondria
A Brain Energy Imbalance
Part III: Causes and Solutions
What’s Causing the Problem and What Can We Do?
Contributing Cause: Genetics and Epigenetic’s
Contributing Cause: Chemical Imbalances, Neurotransmitters, and Medications
Contributing Causes: Hormones and Metabolic Regulators
Contributing Causes: Inflammation
Contributing Causes: Sleep, Light and Circadian Rhythms
Contributing Causes: Food, Fasting and Your Gut
Contributing Causes: Drugs and Alcohol
Contributing Causes: Physical Activity
Contributing Causes: Love, Adversity and Purpose in Life
Why Do Current Treatments Work?
Putting It All Together: Developing Your Metabolic Treatment Plan
A New Day for Mental and Metobolic Health
ALZHEIMER’S CURE?
This is a HUB OF HOPE written by a *Former Alzheimer’s patient.*
Alzheimer’s was UNKNOWN anywhere in the world until the earliest part of the 20th Century.
Two possibilities exist…
1. It existed but the Plaques and Tangles were *never seen* by *anyone* until the EARLY 1900s in the *most technologically developed country in the world… Germany.*
2. *Something changed*… originally in Germany and subsequently worldwide.
What changed? There are two “obvious” answers that are applicable to “technologically advanced” locations.
The first is the widespread and year-round availability of grain-based foods.
The second is the availability of Aluminum for cooking utensils. It previously was too costly for “popular” use.
The first implies that a satisfactory “solution” MIGHT BE to reduce or eliminate the ingestion of grain-based foods.
The second MIGHT BE to eliminate the use of Aluminum cooking materials.
*Recent post-mortem chemical analyses of “ plaques and tangles” in the brain tissues of deceased Alzheimer’s patients shows that they are *loaded* with Aluminum!
The author, William Miller, is now in his 84th year. Three + years ago, at my annual physical, the MD included an MMSE test. (This is a 30 question test to determine the likelihood that a patient has Alzheimer’s.) I scored in the mid-teens… beginning , and supposedly irreversible Alzheimer’s. 😡
I began reading… including several overnighters… first since University.
I learned that there appears to be a CAUSAL RELATIONSHIP between Bodily Aluminum and Alzheimer’s. This is demonstrated by the fact that my last year’s MMSE score was 28. This year it was 29.
Both are HIGH NORMAL!
Am I cured? I don’t know. But I just returned from vacation travels. I went to the tallest building in the world, rode an elephant, went trout fishing in Argentina and saw an African waterfall so huge that it made Niagra look like a lawn sprinkler!
NEVER EVER GIVE UP!
It *appears* I have “beaten” this disease… to the bafflement of my MDS.
I am not baffled!
Thank you for sharing!!