How to make 2025 a good year for brain health

With the calendar turned over to 2025, lots of Americans, including physicians, are taking actions to begin a new year’s resolution to be healthier.

Many factors that make a healthy body also contribute to a healthy brain, according to a new list by the American Academy of Neurology (AAN).

The Academy has a Brain Health Initiative to assist neurologists and other physicians with information about preventive neurology. At the end of 2024, researchers published “The Neurologist’s Role in Promoting Brain Health,” an Emerging Issues in Neurology article with guidance for doctors.

AAN condensed the information in a news release published for the start of 2025. It’s written as a list of questions that patients can ask their neurologists or primary care physicians. But many of the queries are appropriate for primary care physicians to ask their patients to detect potential factors affecting brain health. Those include physical, genetic and environmental characteristics that affect patients’ bodies and brains.

“Continued advocacy by neurologists, including efforts to fund scientific research and improve access to health care, improves brain health on a national level,” author Linda M. Selwa, MD, FAAN, of the University of Michigan, said in the news release. “Our article shows there are many ways to improve brain health individually. Resolving to improve your brain health in the new year is a great start.”

This slideshow presents the questions from AAN, based on the article and news release.

By the way, the questions also might serve as a checklist for physicians to evaluate their own body and brain health at the start of 2025.