Raising Awareness of the Link Between Hearing and Brain Health

Dr. John Weigand recently appeared on The RESET Talk Show, a popular live program that provides important information and briefings for various communities in the tri-state area.

Dr. Weigand appeared along with his SUNY Downstate colleague Michael Reinhardt, M.D., the director of the Center of Excellence for Alzheimer’s Disease, as well as pediatrician Dr. Shelleyanne Giddings.

In recognition of Alzheimer’s Awareness Month, their 20-minute segment focused on the prevention and interventions for Alzheimer’s disease.

Right now, SUNY Downtown’s prime demographic — those in central Brooklyn — is struggling with access to primary care services. A lot of the community’s prevalent health concerns, such as diabetes, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, lack of access to proper nutrition, and lack of social connection, are also factors that contribute to developing dementia.

Engaging those in central Brooklyn and helping them access primary care services would go a long way toward lowering dementia risk.

But why was Dr. Weigand on a segment about Alzheimer’s disease?

Treating your hearing loss is the most important step you can take to lower your risk for dementia, per a report from the Lancet commission on dementia prevention, intervention, and care.

Or, as Dr. Weigand put it on the show, “hearing loss is the low-hanging fruit when we talk about this topic.”

But why is that?

Hearing loss makes your brain work overtime — it only has sound fragments to work with, which are harder to make sense of. Using extra brainpower to understand what you hear leaves less brainpower for making and retaining memories.

When you treat your hearing loss, your brain once again has plentiful sound information — not fragments — so you don’t use so much brainpower on hearing. You free it up for thinking, memory-making, and other cognitive tasks.

Catch the segment, and more details, here — the segment starts at 41 minutes and 50 seconds into the video.