Brain Training 22 April 2009
Reporter: Andrea Burns
What these women are doing is so much more than just a workout, it is science. Exercise physiologist Mitchell Sewell is keeping a close eye. These retirees are mothers, grandmothers, but today they’re unlikely guinea pigs as apart of an Australian first pilot programme, testing whether regular physical exercise, combined with computer based mental exercises can slow or even stop the clock on memory. It’s called Brain training.
Alzheimers Australia’s David Gribble says “people are always complaining they’re starting to lose the mental faculties they had when they were younger and this programme’s really designed to give it back again”.
Treadmills will get the blood pumping through the body and then comes the computer work out which is like an exercise bike for the mind.
Norma, Nola, Ruby and Helen will do body and brain exercises twice a week, for the next 20 weeks. Other groups in retirement villages will also do the programme every day for 8 weeks. These results will be assessed later.
In the U.S.A, David says programmes like these are already in use in hundreds of thousands of retirement villages. He’s confident these participants will see real changes.
“They will tell you that they are more confident and that they can remember phone numbers and people’s names better. They don’t walk into the room as often and think “why did I come in here”. All of those things that we all experience as we age and this programme is designed to address”.
http://www.7perth.com.au/view/today-tonight-articles/brain-training/
Find out more about the Posit Science Brain Fitness Program Classic HERE
