The Nun Study: A Unique Research Project on Aging and Alzheimer Disease
Many are not aware that the nuns who taught us so many years ago may still be helping us today in their old age and may continue helping us even after their deaths. Sláinte is referring to the many women in religious orders who have volunteered to take part in scientific research that will not benefit them directly, but will contribute to our understanding of disease and how to prevent it.
When looking for a population to study, the more alike the subjects are the better. That way you don’t have to worry if the observations you’ve made might have been because some of your subjects smoked or had numerous sexual partners 50 years ago.
Nuns do not drink, smoke, or take drugs. They do not have sex or bear children. But they do share the same environment, usually as teachers, and usually have had access to the same level of medical care for the greater part of their lives.
When sisters do or do not get sick, it won’t be due to differences in their personal histories because their histories are usually all the same. Other religious groups such as the Lutheran Brotherhood and Seventh Day Adventists have also contributed greatly to science by taking part in studies but they are not as perfect a research study group as are the sisters.
It was the nuns lower incidence of cervical cancer that led researchers to discover the connection between cervical cancer and sexually transmitted disease. The nun’s celibacy protected them. It was the nuns higher incidence of breast cancer that led researchers in the early Sixties to propose that hormones from pregnancy could affect a woman’s chances of developing breast cancer. In this case, it was the nuns childlessness that put them at greater risk.
Without doubt the sisters who have contributed the most to science would have to be the School Sisters of Notre Dame. In 1986, David Snowden, an assistant Professor of Epidemiology at the University of Minnesota, approached the sisters about taking part in a study of aging and Alzheimer disease. The 678 sisters who agreed to take part in the study consented to yearly physical and mental exams for as long as they lived and then to donate their brains at death.
The study with the School Sisters was dubbed the Nun Study. At its start, the sisters were 75 to 102 years old. This is what is called a prospective study. Most studies are retrospective, they study people who are already sick and look backward and try to determine how they got that way. A prospective study looks forward into the future; it studies a group of healthy people and waits for them to get sick.
Prospective studies are slow and require years of cooperation and dedication from the participants but the results are much more accurate.
The nuns gave the researchers access not only to their medical records but to their convent records too, including school transcripts and information on their parents’ social and economic status. Researchers are able to compare each nun’s present physical and mental condition with their past condition, and so can determine what early life experiences could affect brain function and the development of Alzheimer's disease.
For example, when 93 of the nuns were novices, they had been asked to handwrite an autobiography. Today these same nuns are in their eighties, and just like the general population, one third of them have developed Alzheimer's disease.
Researchers have compared these autobiographies, written when they were in their twenties, to the nun’s present day health and discovered that the nuns who were positive when they were younger were more likely to live longer. Moral: The more you like living, the longer you are likely to live.
Those autobiographies showed something else. The nuns who used more grammatically complex sentences and expressed more complex ideas in their writings were much less likely to develop Alzheimer's diseases than the nuns who used simpler sentences and ideas. This was an unexpected finding and one that researchers still cannot explain. Could Alzheimer's disease and dementia start so early in life? Moral: Take care of your brain now or you may not remember to do so when you are older.
Another study found that nuns with a lower education and smaller head circumference were four times as likely to be demented as the rest of the nuns. Moral: The more you know, the more likely you are to keep it. No, Sláinte is not going to tell what is considered a small head circumference so you can put away your tape measure.
In a subset of nuns who lived in one convent and ate out of the same kitchen, low levels of the B vitamin folate were strongly associated with atrophy of the cerebral cortex. Moral: Leafy greens are brain food; learn to like them or take a supplement.
If you’ve spent any time on the internet you have heard about the horrors of mercury, a neurotoxin that is released in small quantities from amalgam (silver) tooth fillings. Some scientists have thought this metal might be involved in the development of Alzheimer's disease.
Researchers measured the levels of mercury in the deceased nun’s brains and found that having dental amalgam fillings did not cause Alzheimer's disease or increase the amount of mercury in their brains. Moral: Your silver fillings will not kill brain cells so don’t bother having them removed. Instead, use those fillings to chew some leafy greens.
These are just a few of the findings from the many research papers that have been published since the Nun Study began. Many more will follow.
After working with the nuns for almost 20 years Dr. Snowden’s advice for aging healthy includes:
* keep your mind active in old age by reading, leaning new skills and doing puzzles;
* keep your body active by exercising regularly and taking walks;
* eat well balanced meals with plenty of fruits and vegetables;
* be committed to helping others;
* strengthen family ties;
* and belong to a supportive and helpful community such as a church or other religious group, club or neighborhood group.
The mission of the School Sisters of Notre Dame is “to serve Jesus through educational ministry.” Because of their participation in the Nun study, these sisters will continue on in this ministry long after they have retired from teaching and even long after their deaths. We all owe them a debt of gratitude.
If you would like to read more about the nuns who are taking part in this study, Sláinte strongly suggests you read Aging with Grace (Bantam Books, 2001). It tells the story of Dr. Snowden and his relationship with the women in the Nun Study. Dr Snowden donates half of the book’s royalties to the nuns. For more information, visit: www.mc.uky.edu/nunnet/AgingWithGrace.htm. You can also visit the Nun Study’s webpage: www.nunstudy.org, and the School Sisters of Notre Dame website at: www.ssnddallas.org.
Sláinte!
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