Nicotine and Memory Problems

[Vocalek]

RESEARCH ARTICLE
Association Between Lifetime Cigarette Smoking and Lewy Body Accumulation


The abstract can be read here:

Wiley InterScience :: Session Cookies

Lewy Body Disease (LBD) is a form of dementia often confused with Alzheimer's Disease (AD). The differences are that LBD is actually a form of Parkinson's and also involves progressive stiffness and mobility issues.

The dementia associated with Lewy body disease affects:

• memory
• language
• the ability to judge distances
• the ability to carry out simple actions
• the ability to reason.

People with this form of dementia suffer hallucinations for example seeing a person or pet on a bed or a chair when nothing is there.

My 87-year old mother, a lifetime nonsmoker, has FINALLY been diagnosed with LBD. In the past, when I have abstained from all forms of nicotine, I have had similar symptoms (but not the hallucinations, which my mother DOES have.)

Apparently the nicotine is protecting me from turning into my mother. Please, dear God, don't let the "quit or die" FDA take away my nicotine, and along with it, my sanity.

[TropicalBob]

Do remember the multitude of nicotine sources: snus, dissolvables, nasal snuff, tobacco pieces (Oliver Twist). Also cigars and pipes that are not inhaled. Don't limit yourself to the limited nicotine we get from e-cigs. Broaden your sources and have options if an ax chops off one.

Yes, nicotine has benefits, as well as some vascular consequences. It behooves each of us addicts to know them all.

[Kate51]

TB,
Let me put a word here. I have ADD (all my life), which does HUGELY affect short-term memory access, and long-term memory recall.
I'm actually a little afraid of going 0 nic. No, make that a LOT afraid.
The difference between smoking cigarettes and vaping is immeasurable.
I suspect the dirty parts of a cigarette masked over the benefit of the nicotine, does that sound right? So you with your snuss are probably getting it right.
My short-term and long-term memory access was getting sharper and sharper, from the time I started vaping, almost 6 months ago. Now it seems as though it has become stable, improvement leveled off. But I have NOT experienced the frustrating, humiliating, embarrassing, debilitating, and depression-causing symptoms of ADD in that frequency as before going to Vapor! Call me crazy..... But it was so profound and surprising I couln't help but notice it. Umm, my husband noticed too. Says I'm not so quick tempered. Geez, wha.tf That is the frustration factor. Doesn't mean he's any easier to live with, for sure!
Your Mom and you have my deepest sympathy, my husband's mother's family had issues with dimentia and Alzheimers'. It is so devastating for everyone.

[Vocalek]

Thanks, Kate.

[Vocalek]

I found out the link I posted did not work. Here is an extract from the abstract (she said distractedly).

Brain Pathology. 2009 June 15 [Epub ahead of print]
Association Between Lifetime Cigarette Smoking and Lewy Body Accumulation.


Tsuang D, Larson EB, Li G, Shofer JB, Montine KS, Thompson ML, Sonnen JA, Crane PK, Leverenz JB, Montine TJ.
Departments of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA.

We tested the hypothesis that lifetime cigarette use might be associated with reduced risk of neuropathologic changes of Lewy-related pathology (LRP) in multiple brain regions or with reduced risk of consensus neuropathologic changes of AD in a prospective community-based study of brain aging and dementia, the Adult Changes in Thought (ACT) study. We observed that heavy lifetime cigarette smoking (>50 pack years) was associated with significantly reduced relative risk (RR) for LRP, but not AD-type pathologic changes, after correcting for selection bias, and with significantly reduced frequency of LRP in the substantia nigra. These findings are the first of which we are aware to associate reduced LRP in human brain with any exposure, and substantiate observational studies that have associated cigarette smoking with reduced risk of PD. Although cigarette smoking is too toxic to suggest as a treatment, if confirmed, these findings may guide future therapeutic strategies that attempt to suppress LRP in human brain by other means.

[TheLizinator]

My grandfather was diagnosed with Parkinson's, couldn't tolerate L-dopa, so he lived with the tremors, flat affect, etc. for just under 20 years! He was a health-nut long before it was fashionable to be one; he was also a welter-wt. professional prize-fighter and sparred with a few of the world champ heavyweights. Took many head blows during those years and it was speculated that it contributed to the Parkinson's. While the disease progressed, he still maintained a fairly decent quality of life over two decades. LOL he always liked to pinch my grandmother's butt when she passed by but the tremors made it tough. I would see him take his other hand, clamp down on the "pinching" arm so he could get a grip on her.

He was a brilliant man, studied and taught graduate level calculus and physics without more than 2 years total formal education, so finding out he had a brain disorder was a harsh reality for him to accept. He kept up his intellectual pursuits right up till the final few months of his life when he vacillated between being lucid and going into states of apparent incoherence. The final phase he was not conscious, but hung on with strong vitals for a very long time. He passed at the age of 86. Getting a dx for Parkinson's is not a death sentence anymore and science has made huge strides in treating the disease (and thus prolonging life expectancy).

[Vocalek]

Although related, LBD is a bit different from straight Parkinson's. Dementia is the #1 feature of LBD, with the Parkinsonian symptoms a secondary consideration. My mother has no tremors whatsoever. She has stiffness, problems arising from a chair, getting into and out of a car, and balance issues. She falls about once a month and cannot get up.
Central feature

• Progressive dementia – deficits in attention and executive function are typical. Prominent memory impairment may not be evident in the early stages.

Core features:

• Fluctuating cognition with pronounced variations in attention and alertness.
• Recurrent complex visual hallucinations, typically well formed and detailed.
• Spontaneous features of parkinsonism.

Supportive features:

• Repeated falls and syncope (fainting).
• Transient, unexplained loss of consciousness.
• Autonomic dysfunction.
• Hallucinations of other modalities.
• Visuospatial abnormalities.
• Other psychiatric disturbances.

She gets very frustrated at her inability to remember things. She has stopped using the stove and oven altogether. Last time she used the oven, she set her potholders on fire. So she uses the microwave and her slow-cooker.

I got her a cell phone that is super-simple to operate. To answer a call, you open it up. To hang up, you close the phone (clam-shell type). I showed her how to use it several times. One day I asked her about it and she said, "Well I can't use it until you show me how it works." So I showed her again, on several more occasions.

One day she said to me, "You should get me a cell phone." That's when I decided that I had been wasting the money for the extra account and took the damn thing home with me.

She doesn't just have hallucinations (like the cat and dog who show up on her patio every night and never move), she has delusions, as well.
She has an angel who lives on top of her TV set and two demons that live in her curio cabinet. The reason she falls down is that the demons push her down.

So no, this is not a death sentence.

No cure or definitive treatment for Lewy body dementia has been discovered as yet. The disease has an average duration of 5 to 7 years. It is possible, though, for the time span to be anywhere from 2 to 20 years, depending on several factors, including the person’s overall health, age and severity of symptoms.

Lucky for mom, she loves fruits and vegetables and has never had a heart attack or stroke. So she will probably stick around for the 20 years.

[sunkissedbeach]

My father in law smoked three packs a day of unfiltered Paul Malls for fifty years.
He stopped smoking around ten years ago and around that time developed Alzheimer's.
He is in the very advanced stages now, it is very sad.

[stevo_tdo]

My father in law smoked three packs a day of unfiltered Paul Malls for fifty years.
He stopped smoking around ten years ago and around that time developed Alzheimer's.
He is in the very advanced stages now, it is very sad.

I used to chain smoke like crazy. I'm very grateful now to be off cigarettes but my mind is wearing thin. I have schizophrenia and there have been plenty of studies on the benefits of nicotine, memory, and mental function. I would estimate that I get somewhere around ten times less nicotine then I did a month ago (based on the amount I vape, the strength of my juice, and the results of nicotine absorbtion from the New Zealand study). As my brain chemistry gets used to less nic it is becoming more apparent how much i need it.

Hell I can't remember words or places or names half the time anymore. I think i'm going to have to bump my nic juice way up there now. I didn't want to smoke myself to death with tobacco but at the same time papa needs his nic.

[TropicalBob]

Steve: Use other alternatives. Seriously. Use them all!

You need nicotine. It does good things for your brain. You're not imagining benefits; they are real. E-smoking is not likely to EVER satisfy your nicotine needs, even at high levels in e-liquid. Get thee quickly to snus, dissolveables, nasal snuff, etc. Use them all!

How can anyone look at the Health New Zealand studies and think e-smoking is THE answer? It is only part of an answer.

You might even consider puffing, not inhaling, cigars or a pipe. Nicotine is not a demon, especially in your case. Use it to your benefit.