Max Lugavere

So, you know, you definitely want to cater to your mental, mental health, find ways of mitigating stress and find ways of staying socially connected.

Regular use of saunas have been linked to reduced risk for dementia.

These are observational studies, and they're studies primarily done in a part of the world where sauna use is very common, like in Finland.

A hundred percent.

There's in Finland, you have on average one sauna per household, which is like a lot different than, you know, here in the United States, which I think, you know, is actually kind of cool because it accounts for some of the healthy user bias that might otherwise confound that observation.

Like in Finland, sauna use is like taking a shower, like it's so much ingrained in the in the culture there.

In that part of the world, what they found is that sauna use two to three times a week is associated with a roughly 35% reduced risk of dementia.

And then four to five times a week, I believe, was associated with like a 50% risk reduction for dementia.

Wow, that's incredible.

Yeah, so a dose effect, meaning the more you use it, the more there seems to be this risk mitigation.

And I think one of the major mechanisms there, if that observational finding is to bear out in other data –

I think part of it has to do with the fact that regular sauna use can reduce risk of hypertension.

It increases your heart rate and it increases blood pressure when you're sitting in the sauna.

But then there's a rebound effect where it tends to, you know, I think it tends to reduce blood pressure and heart rate afterwards.

It's like the best form of aerobic exercise you can do while sitting perfectly still.

In a sauna it boosts nitric oxide.

So it's really good for your blood vessels and that's all great from a brain health standpoint So I'm a big fan of sauna use, you know within means you can you can probably go overboard there's probably there's likely a u-shaped curve in the sense that like Using sauna regularly is probably very good for you In comparison to not using it at all, but then using it too much is probably you know Not good either the same way that we could overdo exercise the same way that we can do other healthy behaviors.

I think exercise is one of the best things that you can do and encouraging loved ones that are experiencing cognitive decline to exercise and exercise vigorously.

I mean, there is good data suggesting that that can slow the course.

So nobody's ever recovered from Alzheimer's disease, unfortunately.