Food Choice Might Be Key to Alzheimers
By EDDIE ADELSTEIN
I opened the back of a white-gold 1930s Elgin wristwatch and found the initials of my son, Jake Lawrence Adelstein, engraved inside the case. The chances of that randomly occurring are approximately 1 in 17,000. I then typed these initials into Google, and the Web site of the Justice League of America appeared, and a voice came out of my computer and said, "You can save the world."
Normally I would have ignored these amazing coincidences, but recently I have become obsessed with the possibility that I might know and understand why Alzheimer’s disease is reaching epidemic proportions in the United States and a rational approach for prevention. I also immediately knew that I have crossed the line of conventional thought, but I would like to share information leading to these conclusions. If nothing else, it makes interesting reading and food for thought.
Alzheimer’s disease is a very scary disease. We appear to have an epidemic of this disorder in America. The rates reported in 1989 were 3 percent for 65- to 74-year-olds, 19 percent for 75- to 84-year-olds and 47 percent for people 85 years and older. These rates have significantly gone up in the time from 1990 to 1999.
I personally know many families who have parents or grandparents with this disease and witness the terrible social, moral and financial burden that this disease produces. This is of great interest to me, as I would like to live to my 80s and keep my wits.
These statistics are in contrast to a recent study in China, where the rate of Alzheimer’s in a population age 69 or older was 1.26 percent, with the incidence in men at .76 percent. While statistical information is difficult to evaluate, there appears to be a lower incidence of this disease in Japan, Korea and Vietnam.
What these countries have in common is the consumption of rapidly growing vegetables, especially bean sprouts. If a disease takes 40 to 60 years to develop, then diet would seem important, and the diet in America has dramatically changed from a garden diet to a highly processed one.
Alzheimer’s is characterized by a progressive, altered mental state or dementia and is characterized by two distinct lesions in the brain. Many neurons have their cell cytoplasm filled with structures called microtubules and microfilaments. Microtubules make up the spindle apparatus, which allows the chromosomes to be pulled into each daughter cell during cell division and is involved with intracellular transport and motility of cells. These nerve cells degenerate and die when their cytoplasm fills up with these filaments and tubules.
The second lesion is the presence of plaques, which contain filaments and other abnormal proteins. Much of the current research has focused on the plaque formation. These plaques appear to me as complicated gravestones of dead neurons.
By the time symptoms of Alzheimer’s appear, there are already many dead neurons, and current drugs have only a minimal benefit.
One of the advantages of tenure is that it allows risky speculative research that could easily lead to negative results with no publications.
A number of years ago, I became interested in plant products that we use as anti-cancer agents. The University of Missouri-Columbia College of Veterinary Medicine maintains a poison plant garden, and a colleague was kind enough to give me 10 plants. We made alcohol extracts from such common plants as dogbane, milkweed, buckeye, knapweed, water hemlock and May apple. These are plants that when eaten in large amounts by animals can cause sickness and death.
I incubated these extracts with human tumor cell lines and normal human fibroblasts, and in many cases there was significant inhibition of growth and even cell death. Looking at the treated cells using light and electron microscopy, it appeared that most of these extracts acted upon the microtubular system and inhibited mitosis and thus cell growth.
Almost all the anti-cancer drugs that we get from plants also act upon the microtubular system either by destroying microtubules or stabilizing them so that they no longer can carry out their normal functions. Then like a true scientist, I ran controls of normal plants that are not known to be poisonous and noted that extracts from them also inhibited tumor cell growth but only at full strength, whereas poisonous plants could be diluted as much as 200 times and still inhibit cell growth. Because these normal plants inhibited human cell growth, I lost interest in these studies and filed these observations as another example of a failed experiment.
Two years ago, while I was the chief medical examiner of Boone and Callaway counties, I carried out an autopsy on a 44-year-old male who was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. This diagnosis was confirmed when a section of his brain showed the neurons stuffed with microtubules and filaments and numerous plaques.
Most of us have some of these neurons in our brain as we get older, and the diagnosis is a quantitative one based on the actual number of dead neurons and plaques as related to age. Reviewing the results of my failed experiments caused me to wonder whether plants and plant products might help us destroy these microtubules in our brain and thus be the basis for a treatment.
I did a Web search using the words "vegetarianism" and "dementia" and found a study that showed there was a 50 percent decrease in dementia in the plant-eating group.
I was fortunate to have a resident in pathology, Henry Wang, who was born in China. He was recognized by all of us as exceptionally smart, and I noticed that every day he ate bean sprouts. He and other Asian people believe that these highly activated plants, generally mung or soybean spouts - not alfalfa - provide special ingredients for a long and healthy life.
When I asked why not just eat the beans, the answer usually is that their mothers told them that these living plants contained mystical substances that would promote long life. Wang also confirmed that he knew of very few people in China with Alzheimer’s. Today, the best advice we can give on how to avoid Alzheimer’s is to exercise daily and eat the Mediterranean diet, which is high in fresh fruits and vegetables as well as fish oil and antioxidants.
Alzheimer’s-like lesions occur in dogs but not in grass-eating animals such as cattle, sheep or horses, to the best of my knowledge. Recently, a group of aged beagle dogs was fed a Mediterranean diet, and there was an improvement in cognitive testing after two years.
Interestingly enough, the Bible (Ezekiel 4:9) talks about the "bread of life," which is described as placing wheat and barley in a vessel. That has been interpreted that the bread is made from sprouted grain. You can buy Ezekiel 4:9 bread as a commercial product, and it is made from sprouts of multiple grains. However, there is little scientific evidence regarding the bioavailability of these substances when heated.
In 2004, scientists isolated iso-flavinoids, which inhibit the cell cycle and likely act on the spindle formation during cell division. There are studies that demonstrate that these substances are absorbed intact and thus enter our body as active substances.
I also discovered that some bean sprouts get contaminated with bacteria, especially salmonella, and carry a slight risk. There are multitudes of articles, some by U.S. Department of Agriculture, indicating the value of flavinoids and the reduction in dementia. There are also numerous articles, usually written in "naturalistic journals," suggesting that bean sprouts are one of the foods that appear helpful in the treatment of Alzheimer’s.
There might be nothing magical about bean sprouts other than the fact that they are the freshest and most rapidly growing plant that you can eat. They are generally eaten alive, and thus all the flavinoids produced would be active.
Based on these observations, I have submitted a grant proposal to carry out specific scientific studies and have recruited a highly competent resident physician, Dava Cleveland, as my research associate.
While hopefully waiting for funding, it seemed reasonable to test the theory that the eating of bean sprouts might improve my daily living and perhaps ward off dementia. I would buy a juicer and blend the juice of about two cups of bean sprouts with the juice of an apple, two pears and some ginger root. This is a very pleasant drink, and I have carried out this experiment for the past 40 days.
My wife laughs a lot and believes me mad; however, the results are interesting: I rarely forget to carry out the multiple orders I receive from my wife and children, sleep better, bend better, deal with stress better, procrastinate less, and am better. Is this real or a placebo effect? I only wish I knew. I do not think I could fool myself for 40 days, but the placebo effect is powerful. I have induced at least four other people to eat or juice bean sprouts, and when asked how they feel after a one-month trial, the answer is always "I feel better."
It could take many years of serious research studies to prove the value of bean sprouts. I invite the curious to try eating them daily for one month and note whether there are beneficial effects.
This op-ed originally appeared in The Columbia Daily Tribune, Jan 10, 2006.
Eddie Adelstein is an assistant professor of pathology at the University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri.