653: A neurologist's honest take on Alzheimer's blood tests | Richard Isaacson, MD

"There is no one magic test for brain health,” says Richard Isaacson, MD.    Isaacson is a Harvard-trained neurologist who directs the Precision Prevention Program at Atria Health and Research Institute and founded the world's first Alzheimer's Prevention Clinic at Weill Cornell Medicine/NewYork-Presbyterian. A leader in precision-medicine approaches to Alzheimer's risk reduction, he has served as principal investigator for multiple research initiatives focused on individualized care. He recently led an NIH-funded clinical trial showing that a free online tool (RetainYourBrain.com) reduced Alzheimer's risk by 16% in six months, and is working to democratize brain health testing through an at-home, lower-cost blood biomarker test (AlzLabs.org). Show notes: 00:00 - What we don’t know about Alzheimer’s 04:49 - Where to start with Alzheimer’s risk 06:55 - Lifestyle first: optimizing what you can control 10:39 - Using wearables & health tech for brain health 16:19 – Why there's no perfect blood test for the brain 29:06 - Cutting through the information noise 31:10 - Steps to take when symptoms appear 35:37 - Is it actually memory loss? 38:54 - The future of Alzheimer’s testing Referenced in the episode:  Free cognitive risk & assessment tools: retainyourbrain.com Free information about blood biomarkers: ind.org/bloodtest   Free information about home testing: alzlabs.org We hope you enjoy this episode, and feel free to watch the full video on YouTube! Whether it's an article or podcast, we want to know what we can do to help here at mindbodygreen. Let us know at: [email protected]. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices