Food For Thought

From Massachusetts General Hospital’s Mind, Mood & Memory.

WANT A KEENER MIND AND A more balanced mood in older age? A healthy diet may hold the key. Although it’s a small organ, the brain is metabolically the most active organ of the body, and it requires continuous nourishment for optimal functioning.

“Diet has a very important effect on brain function and cognition, and mounting evidence suggests that enhancing your diet by paying more attention to the range of foods you eat and the quality of those foods can help improve your chances of staying sharp and mentally healthy,” says Uma Naidoo, M.D., a psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital, an instructor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and an expert on the effects of food on neurochemistry.

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