My 23andMe Says I Am at Risk for Age-Related Macular Degeneration. What Should I Do for Prevention?

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My 23andMe says I'm at risk for age related Macular degeneration. What should I do to prevent it? This is JJ Virgin four time New York Times best selling author, celebrity nutrition expert and Fitness hall of Famer. I've been on a lifelong quest for answers to the toughest health questions and now I'm sharing what I found with you. Welcome to Ask the Health Expert. Julie From Facebook asks, My 23andMe says I'm at risk for age related macular degeneration. What should I do for prevention? Hey, JJ here. And I've got board certified neuro ophthalmologist Dr. Ronnie Bonick back here to answer this question. When she's not working in her busy medical practice, writing books or teaching at Mount Sinai in New York City, she's out literally exploring the world. Her favorite adventures include mountain gorilla trekking in Rwanda, whitewater rafting in Costa Rica, and hiking up the red sand dunes of Namibia. She'll be right back.

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I want to thank you for bringing this up because this is a very important eye health topic because macular degeneration is one of the leading causes of blindness, not only in the US but also in the world. And people are absolutely terrified that they're going to lose their vision from macular degeneration. Perhaps they've had a family member who's lost vision and they're afraid that they're going to get it as well. Or they've been diagnosed with an early stage of the condition and they're afraid of progressive vision loss. Or perhaps, like you, they've done a genetic test like 23andMe, and they have a gene for macular degeneration and they want to do everything possible to prevent it. Now, the good news is there are absolutely ways to prevent macular degeneration. There are strategies that you can use in terms of your nutrition and your lifestyle choices to help decrease your risk of macular degeneration. But before I actually talk about what those strategies are, I do first want to explain what macular degeneration is, because there may be some people who are listening who are not familiar with the condition. So macular degeneration is a disease of the retina. The retina is the light sensing layer in the back of the eyes. And the center of the retina is called the macula. And the macula is responsible for our central vision, meaning our high resolution 2020 vision. And what happens in macular degeneration is that with time, deposits begin to form underneath the retina. And these deposits are waste deposits. They are not normal and they cause inflammation. And over time, this inflammation leads to new blood vessels forming underneath the retina. These blood vessels begin to leak because they're not normal either. And they leak blood and fluid and proteins out underneath the retina, which causes central vision loss. So basically with macular degeneration. People lose their central vision. It's difficult to read, it's difficult to drive, to see faces, to even use a device. It can be quite, quite debilitating. But because there is leakage in the back of the eye, I like to call macular degeneration a type of leaky eye syndrome. Now, many of you may have heard of the terms leaky gut or leaky brain or leaky heart. Well, macular degeneration is the prototype for a leaky eye syndrome, and the root cause of it is inflammation. So in terms of the genetics of macular degeneration, yes, definitely there are genetic risk factors, and if you have a family member with it, then your risk is certainly higher. But so far, there have been over 50 genes identified with macular degeneration and vision. Researchers and ophthalmologists really don't fully understand what those genes do. And the other thing that's important is not only do we not understand what those genes do, also, just having a gene does not necessarily mean that you're going to get the condition and lose vision. There are other factors involved that may turn a gene on or off and either increase or decrease your risk for macular degeneration. And these other factors are called. Collectively, they're called epigenetic factors. And some of these factors may come from within us. For example, within our bodies, if we have a nutrient deficiency or if we have inflammation, that could be an epigenetic factor that may increase our risk, or if there's an external factor, for example, a toxin in the environment, that may also increase our risk. So let me go through what some of the most common epigenetic factors are, because then you can really understand how you can try to prevent this condition. So the research has shown us that the main epigenetic risk factors for macular degeneration include smoking. So it can actually double or triple your risk of macular degeneration. And vision loss, obesity, and increased waist circumference are also risk factors. Epigenetic risk factors. Poor nutrition, meaning a diet which is low in fruits and vegetables is known to be a risk factor, as well as a diet which is rich in unhealthy fats and processed foods. And then finally, inflammation within the body is a known risk factor for macular degeneration. So how can you modify all of these epigenetic factors to reduce your risk? You know, this is a really important question, because I'm a strong believer that macular degeneration is a preventable disease if you make the right nutrition and lifestyle choices. And, you know, I felt so, so strongly about this that I decided to write a book about it. And so my new book, the Macular Degeneration Prevention Protocol, is coming out in the fall of 2020. And I'll go through what all of those strategies are in the book. But just to give you a synopsis of it, let me just explain what some of those strategies are now. So, number one is to stop smoking. I mean, that's a very straightforward, simple strategy. Number two is to have a diet which is rich in antioxidants. Now, antioxidants include vitamins like vitamin C, E, A, as well as certain carotenoid pigments called lutein, zeaxanthin, and meso zeaxanthin. Now, I know these are nutrients that are sometimes hard to pronounce and hard to remember, but they are best found in green leafy vegetables, for example, spinach, kale, collard greens, romaine lettuce. They're also found in yellow and orange fruits and vegetables like orange peppers, corn, corn, even egg yolk is rich in lutein and zeaxanthin. So be sure to have some of these important foods in your diet for prevention of macular degeneration. The other thing is to avoid an inflammatory diet. So most Americans are on what's called the Standard American diet or the SAD diet, which is a diet which is rich in unhealthy fats, refined carbohydrates, and processed foods. So as opposed to doing a SAD or being on a SAD diet, I recommend what's called the MAD diet, the macular degeneration diet, which is again, something that I talk about in my book. But replace out all of those SAD foods with more MAD foods. The other thing to do is to try to decrease your body's risk of inflammation. And one of the most important things you can do for this is to have regular exercise. So it's been shown that exercise two or three times a week can decrease your risk for macular degeneration. Also important includes stress management, healthy sleep habits, moderate caffeine intake and detoxification is very important. I mentioned before that smoking is a toxin, but there are other toxins as well, which, which may increase your risk for macular degeneration. And then another toxin is light. So blue light in particular may be a toxin for the retina and cause damage to the retina. So it's important to protect against all of this. And I talk about all these strategies more in my so the cornerstone to prevention of macular degeneration is really having a healthy diet, so healthy nutrition and also smart lifestyle choices to help decrease your risk. And they will allow you to have not only good vision and retain good eyesight, but also general health as well.

This is JJ with Ask the Health Expert. I do this five times a week, so make sure you never miss a show by going to subscribetoj.com.

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