Brain Games Aid the Elderly, Baby Boomers

By Rob Waters, Bloomberg News 

April 7, 2008

World

It's 1 p.m. at the Heritage Estates' Brain Gym in Livermore, Calif., and the gym rats are starting their workout. 

Dorothy Emmrich, age 100, straps on a headset and glares at a computer screen showing rows of playing cards. Each makes a different sound when she clicks on it. She searches for pairs that make matching sounds, a classic memory game. 

The software was created by Posit Science Corp. It is one of about 20 companies, including Nintendo, pitching brain games to the elderly and baby boomers to delay or blunt the onset of dementia. The market will surge to $2 billion by 2015 from $225 million last year, says Alvaro Fernandez, co-founder of SharpBrains, a consulting company. 

"This is a whole new sub-industry — exercise equipment for your brain," says Andrew Carle, an assistant professor at George Mason University. "If Suzanne Somers could make millions of dollars off the ThighMaster, think what you could do with brain-trainers." 

About 5.2 million people in the U.S. already have Alzheimer's — a progressive and fatal disease that destroys brain cells — and 10 million baby boomers eventually will develop it, says the Alzheimer's Association. 

Brain-training programs for the elderly "will become as common as bingo," says Fernandez, 35, whose company promotes science-based cognitive training. 

People who choose activities that stimulate their minds throughout their lives are less likely to develop dementia, or memory loss, says Robert Wilson, a neuropsychologist at Rush University Medical Center and an early researcher in the field. 

There's little evidence that one type of cerebral exercise is better than another, he says. 

"If I was going to bet on anything, I would bet on reading," says Wilson, 60. "The key is to pick something you enjoy and can sustain over a long period of time." 

People older than 65 who spent an hour a day for eight to 10 weeks using Posit's Brain Fitness program performed better on mental acuity tests than a group who spent the same computer time on educational programs, according to a study the company funded and conducted with the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. 

Louisville, Ky.-based Humana Inc. and Penn Treaty American Corp., in Allentown, Pa., a long-term-care insurer, sell the Posit product to their policyholders. 

Posit, founded in 2002, made money for the first time in the first quarter of 2007, says Jeff Zimman, 51, chief executive officer, who declined to provide details. 

"This is the earliest stage of a new market," Zimman says. 

The Posit program is built on the notions that the brain and its wiring are malleable and that certain experiences can trigger structural benefits, according to Michael Merzenich, 65, a neurologist who co-founded Posit and helped pioneer the concept of brain plasticity. 

"The revolution has occurred in understanding that the machine is massively rewiring itself every time you acquire a new skill or ability," Merzenich says of the brain. "That plasticity is in place to the end of life." 

As the brain ages, its ability to process information declines, Merzenich says. For most people, the drop-off begins in their 30s, with a dramatic decline in their 60s. 

In Merzenich's view, the only way to reinvigorate the brain is through continued learning. That stimulates neurons, the nerve cells that carry messages in the brain, to fire and form new branches. 

At the Livermore brain gym, Kit Spickard, 76, uses her fingers to count out sounds so she can recall the order in which she heard them. She answers correctly and a cartoon appears of a train carrying hamsters along a track. The reward stimulates the brain to crank out chemicals like serotonin and keeps players motivated, Merzenich says. 

The mental exercises are working, she says. "If I leave my shopping list at home, I find I didn't need it anyway," says Spickard.

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