can't find my glasses. Again.Ready to leave the house, I can't remember where I put the damn things***Taking my mind to the gym***

***BRAIN SPA***


....can't find my glasses. Again.Ready to leave the house, I can't remember where I put the damn things. Or who played that little guy in Casablanca (Peter Lorre, I remember minutes later). Or my accountant's first name (it's Ron, stupid!). Or what I did with the form that needs to be filled out that was just on my desk this morning.


Worried by too many stories about the early onset of Alzheimer's, I decide to do something about it, besides upping my Sudoku sessions. I decide to go to BrainSpa.

Brain what? Fact is, I can't even remember how I first heard about the company - radio spot or newspaper item - which bills its three sites around Tel Aviv, with more coming in Jerusalem, as "institutes for cognitive development." The company's multicolored brochure features a head superimposed on the letters BS and some surf pounding a slab of rocks that we'll return to later. "You live a full and active life, but feel like your memory isn't as sharp as it was. Your concentration isn't either. You say it's your age. But it turns out there is something to do about it - BrainSpa!" it proclaims.


Fears about "losing it" have spurred a growth industry in clubs, forums, newspaper articles and columns and other options for tackling memory loss and other cognitive decline. With a rapidly increasing older population, "there's gold in them thar hills," as Dr. A. Mark Clarfield, chief of geriatrics at Soroka Hospital and Sidonie Hecht professor of geriatrics at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, explained recently, leading more private companies like BrainSpa to offer their services to the frequently forgetful.

So there I was in the waiting room of the BrainSpa center in an unassuming Ramat Hahayal office building, the reassuring quiet already having an impact.

New Age, baby, you could sense the New Age, from that same crashing surf picture on the wall to the green and blue crystal-like stones scattered on a table to the scent of myrtle burning in a little pot on Keren the secretary's desk. Relax, it all seemed to say.

To most of us, however, figures about Alzheimer's in Israel and encounters we have with family or friends already stricken with that disease are anything but relaxing. According to Clarfield, worldwide between 5 percent and 10% of people older than 65 will be affected by some form of dementia, the most frequent cause being Alzheimer's disease. That means between 35,000 and 70,000 Israelis. However, in the "old-old" (85 plus) the numbers are more worrisome, with up to 40% suffering from dementia. Alzheimer's disease is responsible for about 60%-80% of dementia, according to Clarfield.

That's reason enough to bring clients to BrainSpa. As manager Ronny Erez, a former head of Jerusalem's Israel Arts and Sciences Academy, explains, founder Dr. Isaac Herman, an international expert in health care insurance, "saw from the insurance point of view the growth of the percentage of people who were suffering from cognitive decline. He saw the cost of it and he had some knowledge of some new research that was saying there was something to do about it... not via medications, but by learning or training."

Erez, who stresses BrainSpa's educational aspect, helped design its program, which has a US patent pending. "It's meant to be pleasant, even the way we built the place... We wanted a very calm atmosphere, with classical music playing in the background, a nice smell and soft lights... We called it BrainSpa because we had international aspirations from the beginning, and we thought it should be a name in English. We wanted spa because we wanted to say that the essence of the program is two elements - one is training and one is learning.

"The idea is that in keeping your mind alive, it's not enough to do only training, like a gym. What do you do in a gym - you go and work out on the treadmill. But you don't go on it to learn how to walk - you know how to walk - but to improve your blood flow, your flexibility; you're improving something that's already there. The same thing for memory, concentration and attention, which are the things the program works on. These things you use all your life; it's a basic tool, like blood flow.

"But when you decide to, for example, learn how to play squash, you create new neurological circles in your brain. You're learning something new, you're enlarging your scope. And my idea - and I tested it with specialists around the world and they agreed - is that if you don't want to lose, you have to gain some new territories…"

BUT IT'S EXACTLY the gym parallel that resonates here, without the smell of the sneakers or the locker room, the sense of "a club" where everybody knows your name.

"When you see that other people have problems similar to yours, when you're focused on these issues and you see those around you also concerned about them, you feel a sense of safety in numbers," says Edna Sa'ar, who at 57 is one of the younger clients.

Indeed, Erez explains, "the social atmosphere is very important to us."

We go on a tour. As we enter, the computer room's 17 stations are buzzing as a mix of couples and singles, ranging in age from 50 plus to late 70s, work the Mindfit55 program, developed by Cognifit Mind Fitness Solutions. ("You can't stop time, but you can delay its effects," says its Web site, stressing "brain power fitness.") The program offers a variety of puzzles, games and other challenges designed to keep sharp and improve various cognitive abilities.

Upon joining BrainSpa, each individual is first given a cognitive evaluation. The Mindfit challenges are tailored individually for each client, the program progressing at his pace through the exercises.

I can play too, and soon feel very retro facing a variation of Pac-Man in which I must erect barricades to keep red orbs from colliding. After a few trials, Erez has the program add another dimension: Four boxes appear around the maze, each flashing pictures. When any two - animals, flowers, etc. - match, I have to register this by pressing the space bar, while still keeping those orbs from crashing.....


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