Health Update: Stress and Brain Inflammation = Fog
Hello again everyone:
Thank you for reading our posts we really appreciate you! Here is some super interesting data on how stress leads to brain inflammation which leads to fog and other brain symptoms like anxiety. This relates to the Covid era where lockdowns and stress have been highly elevated and why even non-infected individuals are experiencing mental health challenges. Here is why the authors did this study:
“While COVID-19 research has seen an explosion in the literature, the impact of pandemic-related societal and lifestyle disruptions on brain health among the uninfected remains underexplored. However, a global increase in the prevalence of fatigue, brain fog, depression and other “sickness behavior”-like symptoms implicate a possible dysregulation in neuroimmune mechanisms even among those never infected by the virus.”
“This study provides novel evidence of elevated neuroinflammatory markers in healthy, non-infected individuals during the COVID-19 pandemic. Subjects evaluated after the onset of the pandemic onset and the implementation of necessary lockdown/stay-at-home measures showed elevations in the brain levels of [11C]PBR28 (measured PET) and mIns (measured using 1H-MRS), thus providing multimodal evidence for neuroinflammation in cortical and subcortical regions including sensory, motor and higher order association areas, and white matter. [11C]PBR28 signal elevations were positively associated with physical fatigue (IPS/precuneus), mental fatigue and mood alterations (hippocampus) and with pro-inflammatory blood markers (IL-16 and MCP-1). Collectively, these findings provide support to neuroimmune responses as mechanisms underlying stress, depression and other symptoms of psychological distress.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8847082/
Bottom Line:
This paper supports previous literature showing how inflammation can alter brain function and disturb our mental health, plus it also shows how stress fires up this process. This means that if you have been suffering with the issues mentioned above, it would benefit you to lower your inflammatory burden and thus improve your neurologic function. How do you do that?
Get outside and move, get some sunlight every day, socialize more, avoid sugar and alcohol and processed foods, go organic, stay hydrated with water, make sure you get at least 7 hours of sleep, take your multivitamins, consume an anti-inflammatory food plan… you can get back to being yourself and even better by creating a comprehensive anti-inflammatory lifestyle. Start with these ideas and if you get stuck, give me a call.