Deep Dives
Alzheimer’s risk and neurodegeneration.
Relative risk, absolute risk, and age of onset: how to read the scary statistics about APOE4 and Alzheimer’s, with real ranges and the hopeful part that gets buried.
APOE4 influences how the brain clears amyloid, handles tau, manages inflammation, regulates neural activity, and maintains its blood vessels. A plain-language tour of the leading mechanisms.
Evidence suggests APOE4 carries a different risk profile for women than men, especially at certain ages. What the research shows, the menopause angle, and its limits.
Women carry most of the APOE4 Alzheimer’s burden. A careful, honest look at menopause, estrogen, and whether hormone therapy helps the APOE4 brain, including the timing debate.
Normal aging, mild cognitive impairment, and dementia are different things. How to tell them apart, what MCI does and doesn’t predict, and when to see a doctor.
Much of what we call "Alzheimer’s" is tangled up with vascular damage. Why protecting your blood vessels is also protecting your memory, and what that means for carriers.
Hearing loss is one of the larger modifiable contributors to dementia risk, and one of the most fixable. What the evidence says, including the ACHIEVE trial, and what to do.
Relationships and a sense of purpose aren’t soft extras for brain health. How social connection and "cognitive reserve" fit into the APOE4 picture, and how to build them.
Do brain-training apps protect your memory, or just make you better at the app? A clear-eyed look at the evidence on cognitive training, and what to do instead.
Depression is on the major modifiable-risk lists for dementia. The relationship is real but two-directional. What it means for APOE4 carriers, and why treating mood is brain care.
Fine-particle air pollution is on the official modifiable-dementia list, and gene-environment data suggest APOE4 carriers take a bigger hit. What the numbers say, and how to lower your exposure.
Carriers facing surgery ask if anesthesia is riskier for them. There is a real short-term signal in the data, and the reassuring part is that it fades by about a year.
APOE4 is the strongest genetic risk factor for Lewy body dementia and sharply raises dementia risk in Parkinson's. What carriers should recognize, and why.
An APOE4 brain runs low on fuel decades before symptoms. What 31P-MRS shows about phosphocreatine, ATP, sex differences, and what to do.
APOE4 doesn't make head injury more likely, but the evidence says carriers tend to recover worse. What that means for sports, helmets, and fall prevention.
High homocysteine is common, cheap to test, and one of the few places a vitamin actually slowed brain shrinkage in a real trial, but only in people who were high to begin with.
The cold-sore virus interacts with APOE4 specifically, raising Alzheimer's odds. Carriers ask if antivirals help. A 2026 randomized trial finally tested it. Here is the honest answer.
You have seen the gum-bacteria-cause-Alzheimer's headlines. The honest version: the link is real, the bacterial-cause story is shaky, and the drug built to prove it failed.
Untreated vision loss is on the official modifiable-dementia list, and people who had cataract surgery developed nearly a third less dementia. One of the most fixable brain-health levers there is.