Patients want early brain health habits, but don't know how

Clinical takeaway: Patients in their 20s to 40s are asking how to protect their brains, and most say they don't know where to start. Have a concrete answer ready: exercise, sleep, diet, and social and mental engagement, rather than cognitive testing at that age. 

Brain health advice is easy to give and hard to make specific. Eat well, stay active, stay connected. A patient in her thirties hears that and leaves with nothing concrete that she should do differently. 

Patients are already convinced that healthy brain habits should start before age 40. It is now the majority view. What they lack is a starting point, and the visit where they ask for one is a routine physical, not a memory evaluation. A national probability-based survey of 1,004 U.S. adults, conducted in May 2026, measured how early adults think prevention should begin and how prepared they feel to act on it. 

Most adults placed the start line for brain health habits before age 40. Six in 10 said they want to prioritize brain health earlier but don't know how. Interest was not confined to people with a family history or existing memory complaints, which means the question is arriving from patients who have no clinical reason to raise it. 

The survey ran May 14 to 18, 2026, on a national probability-based panel of 1,004 U.S. adults, weighted to the adult population, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 points. Ohio State's Wexner Medical Center commissioned it, so the questions were built around brain health rather than drawn from a general health battery. 

"Healthy lifestyle" is what these patients have already heard and it is why they say they don't know how to start. Exercise most days, protected sleep, a Mediterranean-style eating pattern, regular time with people, and something mentally hard on a schedule give a 35-year-old five things to act on instead of an overly broad category. 

Nothing in the survey argues for testing anyone earlier. The release recommends routine cognitive screening from 65 in adults without a family history, which is one specialist's practice rather than a guideline, and it applies to a population three decades removed from the patients driving this demand. Interest in prevention is not a reason to evaluate cognition in someone who has none of the symptoms that would prompt it. 

"Once you start working on your brain health, it could provide a more robust brain reserve which could delay the time to when you may develop memory issues, such as forgetting your keys," said Douglas Scharre, MD, a neurologist and medical director of the Center for Cognitive and Memory Disorders at Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. 

Source: Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. (2026 Aug 12) Survey shows Americans want to start brain health habits earlier