Alzheimer's, Aromatherapy, and the Sense of Smell

Auteur
Jean-Pierre Willem, M.D., is the founder of the French Barefoot Doctors movement, which brings traditional healing techniques back into clinical settings. The author of several books in French on natural healing for degenerative diseases, he lives in France.

Texte du rabat

"Originally published in French under the title Alzheimer & odorat: Quand les arãomes restaurant la mâemoire: Une piste pour le traitement by Guy Trâedaniel âediteur"--Title page verso.

Résumé
• Cites multiple clinical studies to show how Alzheimer’s is critically bound with the sense of smell and how the loss of this sense is often the first symptom of onset

• Details how to use essential oils to stimulate memory, prevent cognitive loss, and counter the isolation, withdrawal, and depression of Alzheimer’s patients

• Reveals the striking results seen in several French hospitals and senior living homes where aromatherapy has been used as a therapy for Alzheimer’s

While there is still no known cure for Alzheimer’s, new research and trials from France reveal that it is possible to slow its progression, ameliorate some of its effects, and improve the quality of life for those suffering from this degenerative condition, using the sense of smell.

Citing years of clinical evidence, Jean-Pierre Willem, M.D., shows how Alzheimer’s is critically bound with the sense of smell. He explains how the olfactory system is connected to the limbic area of the brain, which holds the keys to memory and emotion and is the area of the brain most severely afflicted by Alzheimer’s. He reveals how one of the very first signs of Alzheimer’s is typically the loss of the sense of smell. Sharing the striking results seen in French hospitals and senior living homes where aromatherapy has been used as a therapy for Alzheimer’s for more than 10 years, Dr. Willem details how to use essential oils to stimulate memory, prevent cognitive loss, and counter the isolation, withdrawal, and depression these patients are likely to feel. He explains how essential oils make a direct connection with the cerebral structures involved in emotion and memory and make it possible for the patient to bring deeply buried memories back to the thinking surface. This allows the patient to recover a portion of their identity, which can become the foundation for additional healing, including regaining the ability to communicate and reducing behavioral issues. Tracing the evolutionary links between smell and taste, he also explores the effects of diet and nutrition on Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia, explaining the benefits of raw foods, what foods to avoid, and what supplements can help.

Offering a hands-on and medication-free way to help those suffering from Alzheimer’s, this guide provides a way for Alzheimer’s patients and their families to recover the joy of living again.

Échantillon de lecture
Chapter 1. Alzheimer’s Disease Decoded: Evolution of the Human Olfactory System

Some discoveries are made by chance or intuition, but the majority come from observations. In terms of Alzheimer’s, with its rich symptomatology, one particular clinical observation can suffice for diagnosis and should orient the direction taken by researchers: anosmia. In fact, 95 percent of people suffering from Alzheimer’s disease are affected by the loss of their sense of smell.

No longer being able to smell the odors of nature, of those close to you, or of a perfume, no longer being able to enjoy the flavors of a dish--all these olfactory deficiencies have an undeniably adverse effect on a person’s quality of life. For clinical purposes, loss of the sense of smell comes into play in the very first stages of the disease. However, it can be difficult to evaluate this sensorial deficit because the majority of the tests used require, in addition to sensoreal and perceptual capacities, cognitive abilities and an attention span, all of which tend to become dulled with age, even when no dementia is present.

Many studies have shown that patients with a genetic risk of Alzheimer’s disease or those who have moderate cognitive impairment exhibit significantly greater olfactory alterations than healthy individuals. Conversely, many other studies have shown that people who present with anosmia (complete loss of smell) or hyposmia (reduced sense of smell) are more likely to develop dementia than people who retain their sense of smell.

This specific impairment of the olfactory system in Alzheimer’s disease, as well as its connection with the limbic system and the strong emotional power of olfactory memory, make a powerful argument for directing our attention toward the impact of olfactory disorders in this disease.

EMPLOYING PALEONTOLOGY

When we study phylogenesis, namely the historical evolution of the human species, we learn that our ancestors went through two major epochs: that of the raw, in which the olfactory system dominated, and then, after the discovery of fire, that of the cooked, in which the gustatory system became dominant.

Throughout evolution, every living species, particularly Homo sapiens, created defense systems in response to hostile surroundings. These genetically determined mechanisms are specific to species sharing the same biotope. One adapts to one’s environment and to one’s hostile neighbors in order to survive. Our ancient ancestors used their olfactory system (their sense of smell) as a compass to guide their survival instincts.

First Epoch: The Raw

In the beginning, there was the primitive diet, an “animal” type of diet that was raw and intended to ensure the essentials--namely, survival, reproduction, and adaptation. This raw diet was guided by the olfactory system. As Dr. Félix Affoyon, who has been studying the mechanisms of Alzheimer’s disease, notes:

“It is likely not by chance that, over the course of evolution, the regions of the cerebral cortex that retained a connection with the olfactory system are the phylogenetically speaking ancient systems, such as the hippocampus of the limbic brain, which we know plays a fundamental role in the acquisition of memory, learning, and the emotional aspects of behavior, and the amygdala, which is involved in the emotions and emotional learning. It so happens that these regions are the ones that are affected in Alzheimer’s disease.”

In other words, our ancestors’ sense of smell guided their behavior, cognitive skills, and development.

Second Epoch: The Cooked

With the advent of cooking, humans began to face the intrusion of antigens, substances that our cells recognized as foreign and aggressive. Some paleoanthropologists maintain that this happened 20,000 years ago, in the Neolithic period, when our ancestors transitioned from hunter-gatherers to food producers. Over the course of the millennia and under the repeated assault of the foreign molecules introduced by high-temperature cooking, the olfactory system, which was our primary warning system to the presence of danger, underwent considerable genetic mutations until, slowly but surely, our ancestors’ primitive instinct for survival, reproduction, and adaptation eroded. As Dr. Affoyon notes:

“If, today, human beings are no longer capable of trusting their sense of smell as they once did to avoid toxic foods and foreign molecules, it is because they altered, by chance, the course of things by discovering cooking, the transformation and preservation of foods, which over the course of evolution developed the sense of taste, gradually relegating the sense of smell to a vestigial state.”

Cooking food did some of the same work that our ancestors had previously relied on their se…