Intel­lec­tual Enrich­ment Helped Pre­serve Mem­ory and Learn­ing in Mul­ti­ple Scle­ro­sis Patients, Study Says (WebMD)

• “A small study of mul­ti­ple scle­ro­sis (MS) patients shows that main­tain­ing an intel­lec­tu­ally active lifestyle can help pre­serve learn­ing and mem­ory, even among patients with a high degree of brain damage.”
• “Although there’s no indi­ca­tion that being men­tally engaged pro­tects against brain dam­age itself, the find­ings do sug­gest that an active mind may be bet­ter equipped to retain its func­tions even in the event of brain damage.”
• “The find­ings sug­gest that enrich­ing activ­i­ties may build a person’s ‘cog­ni­tive reserve,’ which can be thought of as a buffer against disease-related mem­ory impair­ment,” says study author James Sumowski, PhD. “Dif­fer­ences in cog­ni­tive reserve among per­sons with MS may explain why some per­sons suf­fer mem­ory prob­lems early in the dis­ease, while oth­ers do not develop mem­ory prob­lems until much later, if at all.”

For a deeper dive into Cog­ni­tive Reserve research and impli­ca­tions, you may enjoy:

• Inter­view with Yaakov Stern on Build­ing one’s Cog­ni­tive Reserve
• Inter­view on Bob Woodruff’s Post-Traumatic Brain Injury Recovery

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