On September 22, Texas Public Radio partnered with UT Health San Antonio to present a panel discussion on the latest developments in how we understand and treat diseases of the brain.
Think Science: A New Era for Advancing Brain Health featured three researchers and their work, and offered a preview of the Center for Brain Health, opening in December.
“This is a dream,” said Dr. Sudha Seshadri at the event.
“Now we have a five-story building where this is not [just] for doctors, this is for all of us as a community. It has spaces for state of the art diagnosis, [and] also for different therapies, so patients and care partners can continue living their best life.”
The Center for Brain Health will include a library and spaces for music and art therapy.
During the panel, Dr. Seshadri emphasized that brain health is not just about the absence of disease, but about “thinking, memory, perceiving, speaking, emotional control… all remaining as good as we would like it to be, so that we can continue doing everything we want to do” into old age.
Most people, she said, develop dementia as a mixture of things; the conditions are purely hereditary in only about 5% of cases, and so there are a variety of preventive measures one can take in early life to stave off brain disorders, much of it linked to physical health, including diet and exercise.
"The best way to preserve your brain health when you grow old is not to wait until you're 60 or 80, but start the day you're born," Dr. Seshadri said.
"It's never too late to start exercising," added Dr. Elena Volpi, who in her presentation discussed geroscience, and shared the latest research on drugs like metformin, rapamycin, and senolytics, which show promise in reducing age-related diseases.
Dr. Matthew Wicklund, the third presenter, discussed the impact of stroke on cognition and stroke treatments at UTSA, talked about deep brain stimulation and MRI-guided ultrasound for Parkinson’s treatment, and progress in gene therapies.
To listen to the full presentation, use the audio player at the top of this page, or embedded below. (Presenters begin at 3:00 into the audio file.) This Think Science event was made possible by SAWS.
