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July 7, 2023 - Sean Hannity Show
31:05
Dr. Nicole Saphier - July 7th, Hour 3

Rose Tennet fills in for the vacationing Sean and sits down with Dr. Nicole Saphier to discuss the aging population in the United States and the impact age has on our communities.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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This is an iHeart podcast.
This is the Sean Hannity Show.
My name is Rose, and I have the honor of sitting in for Sean today.
It's been a lot of fun being with all of you.
I took a different approach today.
I just wanted to have words of encouragement for everyone because it's a crazy life we're living out there, isn't it?
You know, I think that just about everyone knows someone who is suffering with dementia.
And, you know, and it is the most ugly disease out there right now for a number of reasons.
And because of that, I thought it would be interesting to ask Dr. Nicole Sapphire, who is a Fox News contributor and also author of Panic Attack, Playing Politics with Science and the Fight Against COVID-19.
She's here to discuss dementia, and it is a disease that has hitting millions of people every single day.
And it's still very frustrating, not just for the patient, but for the caregiver as well.
So Dr. Sapphire, thank you so much for joining us today.
I appreciate it.
Thank you so much, Rose, for having me.
Excited to be on.
Yeah, you know, one of the things I just read recently was about a village and out, it's outside of Amsterdam.
And what they're doing is they're creating this village where there's shops and restaurants and apartment buildings, and people can live, people with dementia can live among others who don't have it.
But it is entirely set up, though, with the dementia patient in mind.
And I thought, you know, I feel sometimes that we are a little behind, not just here in this country, but globally behind the curveball here because we're not really giving the attention that we should be to dementia patients.
Because Dr. Sapphire, there are so many of them, probably more.
Am I right to say that we are seeing numbers greater than we've ever seen before in the past?
It sure seems like that.
Well, certainly, but also we have an aging population as well, and we are living longer because of modern medicine.
But dementia is really a broad term that really can describe, you know, loss of ability, thinking ability, memory attention, logical reasoning, and other mental abilities, with Alzheimer's disease being the most common cause of dementia.
Now, it's pretty common.
Close to 10%, about 8% of all adults over the age of 65 have some form of dementia.
And that number doubles every five years after 65.
And with Americans living, the average age is now about 80 to 81, you know, you have a lot of people living with dementia.
And as you said, it doesn't just affect the person.
It affects everyone around them.
They are still, sometimes they're physically fit.
They're still completely able to take care of themselves, but mentally they're not all there.
So it is lovely when you hear about these communities that are really focusing on, you know, keeping in mind that there are some people who have really lost that cognitive ability over the years.
But one thing that actually has become very exciting that was just announced today is that we have the first FDA full FDA approval of a medication to slow down the progression of Alzheimer's Alzheimer's disease.
It's called lacanomab.
Interesting.
I didn't know that.
I know there were some meds that you could take to slow it down, but they weren't all that effective, really, doctor.
And it seems that, I mean, and listen, it doesn't change the course of your life if you have a memory issue or cognitive issue.
But you're saying that this new, newly approved FDA-approved drug can really significantly slow it down?
Yeah, so the clinical trial is actually pretty robust and was encouraging in the sense that for people who are just beginning to have signs of dementia or a very Alzheimer's dementia or very mild Alzheimer's dementia, by taking this, it's an infusion, you get it every two weeks, that by this infusion, they did show that they had decreased those plaques in the brain.
And those who had a decrease in those plaques in the brain, they actually had their symptoms were slowed down compared to the placebo arm.
The couple of caveats when it comes to this medication.
One, it's incredibly expensive, and Medicare doesn't cover all of it.
In fact, most people who take this are of Medicare age.
It's interesting, President Biden, he likes to tout that he lowered drug prices and Medicare costs through his Inflation Reduction Act.
But the way that he did that was by actually saying that Medicare won't be covering Alzheimer's medication.
Wow.
It's kind of cheating the system to say that you were able to lower prices when you're just saying, never mind, we're just not going to pay for it.
But also, these medications does come with some potential black box warnings.
A small amount of patients did have brain swelling, brain bleeding, and even with a few deaths.
So just like any medication, you always have to weigh the risk and potential benefit of medications and be in close communication with the doctors.
Yeah, and that makes sense, of course.
And, you know, certainly age has something to do with it.
We have a very large elderly population right now.
The baby boomers are aging.
But I'm seeing even younger people, because I am exposed to this.
I have a loved one that I care for over the last four years.
And I have seen even younger people coming in with cognitive disorders.
And, you know, it really is concerning when you see that.
Do you think, Dr. Sapphire, that environment or diet also plays into the cognitive issues?
Absolutely.
You know, dementia can affect people as young as about even 30.
And this is what we call a young onset dementia, most commonly seen in people in their 50s and early 60s.
There are a variety of reasons that can cause it.
It can be microvascular changes or, you know, cerebrovascular disease of their brain.
It could be drug use.
It could be prior trauma to the brain.
Anything that really can have some brain injury can have advanced aging of the brain.
And then you could start seeing dementia earlier on.
And you do see this a little bit more common in men than women.
They don't really fully understand the risk factors specifically for developing young onset dementia.
But anyone who has a history of any sort of brain trauma or any sort of chemicals affecting the brain, obviously they're at risk.
But for those that don't have that history, we still kind of see it.
So there's still probably some unknown in the brain that we don't know.
The brain is just so complex.
It really is.
We're talking to Dr. Nicole Sapphire.
She's Fox News contributor and author of Panic Attack, Playing Politics with Science and the Fight Against COVID-19.
So let me ask you something, because what I've noticed is I think because there are so many patients now with dementia, some form of dementia, that I don't know how well the healthcare system is prepared to handle them.
And I've been a couple of places.
The most recent place is doing a very great job.
But others, you know, I would find it almost humorous if it weren't so sad.
They would ask a patient like, so how, you know, did you remember to take your medicine today?
They don't remember what they did two minutes ago or what you said two minutes ago.
And I think there's some breakdown in how we've learned to communicate with patients and how then specifically to communicate with patients who have some form of dementia.
And do you think there, I think there's a lot more to learn, particularly because there seems to be so many patients right now with that disease.
Sure, but I don't think that there's been a breakdown.
I think we've never been good at dealing with patients with cognitive issues and memory loss.
I can tell you when I went to medical school, now this is a while ago, you know, we had a couple of tiny lectures to talk about, you know, well, when you ask a patient with dementia or when you just ask a patient, you know, oh, well, did you do this?
And they're like, of course I did.
Like, well, they may actually believe that they did, but they may not have.
So how are you going to double check that?
And so, you know, while I always say that patients know their body best, sometimes you have to double check because you don't know that their cognitive ability at that point.
When it comes to dementia care, I think we are still very behind.
I think we're trying really hard in the medical industry, but ultimately it's lack of resources.
So when it comes to a patient who has some sort of cognitive disability, we really rely on their family and the cadre of people around them, their support system, to tell us really how they're doing and help us communicate and get to the truth of things.
You know, one thing that's really difficult too is when you recognize this in someone that you care about and it's getting them, they don't want to admit that they may have an issue.
They may have a cognitive issue and it's very difficult.
And at the same time, I wonder too that if you could talk to the audience about those who, you know, it's not a matter of walking into a room and thinking, boy, I thought I came in here for a specific reason.
Now I can't remember.
It's not so much that.
What are some of the signs that we should be watching out for in ourselves, perhaps, or for others?
Yeah, well, trying to identify the early signs of dementia is crucial because there are some medications that could help slow the progress, not just the new one I mentioned.
There are two, and there's some behavioral things.
One of the biggest issues with diagnosing dementia is, one, identifying it early, but also some of the emotional aspects that come along with it.
So the most common thing that people start thinking is they have a hard time finding words sometimes.
You know, when you're trying to tell a story and you're like, oh my gosh, what is that word?
It happens to all of us.
As you get older, it tends to happen a little bit more.
Or maybe forgetting where you're going.
Maybe you walk to the store every day for 20 years and all of a sudden you go outside and you start walking and you're like, well, where was I going?
Where is it?
And you just, it can be very subtle, very mild, and this can be very frustrating for people.
And they don't necessarily think to themselves, well, maybe I'm having, you know, starting to develop signs of dementia.
They more focus on how frustrated they are.
And it's trying to get past that emotional hurdle to actually go and seek help is one of the biggest struggles that we have.
So if you suspect something like this, there are tests that can be done.
Isn't that right?
To give yourself some peace if that's what you need or to at least be alerted to the situation.
Absolutely.
So a full cognitive evaluation, really the American Academy of Family Practitioners recommends everyone at the age of 65 and older should be getting them with their physical exam because we have no problem going getting our blood pressure, our cholesterol, our heart listened to.
That's our physical body.
But what about our brain?
That's also a part of our physical exam.
So we should be assessing cognitive evaluation.
And yes, some of the questions may seem silly, but it's these little nuanced questions that can really alert us to early signs of dementia, which we can potentially slow down.
That's an excellent point.
Dr. Nicole Safire, thank you so much, Fox News contributor and author of Panic Attack: Playing Politics with Science in the Fight Against COVID-19.
Thank you so much for joining us today to talk about this really important disease.
Thank you.
Thanks.
Thanks for having me.
Take care.
All right.
So, Sean Hannity Show, you're listening.
And the phone number, if you want to weigh in on any subject, is 800-941-Sean, 800-941-Sean.
We'll be back with so much more.
I'll take your calls.
Lots I want to talk about.
I only have less than an hour to do it.
We can do this together.
All right, this is the Sean Hannity Show.
My name is Rose.
An honor to sit in for Sean.
Listen, would you do me a favor, please?
I appreciate it when you do this.
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So let's take some calls.
Oh, let's see.
Scott has been on for a while.
He's calling from Pennsylvania.
Hey, Scott, how are you?
I'm good, Rose.
Thank you.
Good.
What did you want to talk about?
Well, I want to talk about it was over an hour I was on hold when you were talking freedoms, but I just wanted to point out quickly, based on your last segment, that I know they're now creating positions in government for people that have dementia.
Yeah.
They are doing things for people in this country with dementia.
They're giving them good government positions.
So we are.
You're a real comedian there, Scott.
I said you're a real comedian.
Well, we try to have a little human here.
No, you knew it, Spoke.
I've been on hold for a little over an hour, and I think I might have gotten dementia while I was on here.
Anyway, we were speaking about the freedoms earlier on, which touched my heart and my soul, to be honest with you.
I'm a retired teacher, and what I think we need, but I don't know how to generate this.
I think we need to have a grassroots approach to teaching young people about freedom.
And it's not going to happen in the schools.
No.
So somewhere, if we get readers like you to help train people like me to go into my community and offer courses at a local library.
I love that.
And a course on what freedom is and the things you discuss.
I think that's the only way we're going to have a chance of reversing what's going on because I think you are spot on.
And I try to keep explaining to my children, you know, Every day that you're, you know, you're losing freedom every moment.
We are.
Every day.
Scott, thank you.
I have to cut, I have to cut it off, but I want to tell you something.
First of all, thank you for staying online because I love what you just said.
And I think each community, excuse me, there could be churches or groups in the communities that can put forth these courses on freedom, particularly for children.
And let me tell you something.
The stories are good.
They are amazing.
They're insightful.
They're encouraging.
We have great historic stories to tell our children.
Thank you, Scott, for that.
We'll be back with more.
The time goes so quickly when I'm with you.
It makes me sad almost.
Okay, so listen, you guys are so sweet.
And I'm asking that you just do me a favor.
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Thanks to all of you who waited patiently online.
Diane is calling from North Carolina.
Hi, Diane.
How are you?
Hey, Rose.
How are you?
Good.
Thanks.
Great to hear your voice.
Hey, what I wanted to call on is I have a different opinion, I think, of being a conservative Christian about AI.
Okay.
Talking with my girls about it this past weekend when I was in Pennsylvania, and I was saying, you know, guys, we can't be afraid of this.
The more things change, the more we must depend upon the things that never change, and that's God's grace and his guidance.
And there's so many things telling us we should be afraid of AI.
And as Christians, we need to be afraid of nothing.
There's nowhere God isn't.
And that includes the World Wide Web.
You know, and there's just so many woke things going into there.
Christian conservatives need to enter stuff into there also, or they're going to get bypassed and not have jobs that here's the thing.
AI is going to take thousands of jobs.
Yes, that's right.
It can respond to emails.
It can write resumes.
Not correctly, by the way, all the time.
Not correctly.
But there are jobs it will never take.
And that is the plumber.
That is the mommy raising her children with her hands, doing the work of God.
There are jobs of auto repair and RV repair and the manual labor.
AI is not going to take that away.
And we, as working Christians working with our hands, we shouldn't be threatened by it.
We should learn what we can about it and enter conservative information into it.
Well, at some point, I'm not sure how much input from humans will be necessary.
But Diane, I agree with you on your point that we should not be afraid of anything.
However, there's a fine line there between not being afraid, which I absolutely 100% agree with you on, but also being aware, being aware of the deception.
And as we spoke earlier, there's a lot of deception where AI is involved.
And I think as time goes on and it is, it becomes more prevalent and perfected, that deception will become even greater.
But thank you, Diane, for your call.
And I love what you had to say.
Check us out.
And she is called by him, by the way.
1-800-941-Sean, 1-800-941.
Sean is the phone number.
Virginia is calling from New York.
How are you, Virginia?
Hi.
Hi, Rose.
How are you?
Doing well.
Thank you.
My question, well, actually, my comment.
This whole thing about the cocaine being found in the White House, first of all, I think it's a shock and a disgrace.
And I can't believe that Americans aren't as shocked as I am.
But given that aside, my comment is, one, I think they know whose cocaine it was got there.
I think they know that dead on.
But the fact that they are not telling and that they're playing dumb by it is telling me that if that's true, then the Secret Service are incompetent and they should all be fired.
Right.
So you make a good point, right?
You know that the Secret Service is probably not incompetent, and you know that they probably do know the source of the cocaine.
And, you know, it's amazing how they are backpedaling and trying to walk away from all of this.
But Virginia, I got to tell you, you know, when you make the point that people, they know what's going on.
But when you said shocked, I'm not shocked at all.
Now, but I will say that I am disappointed and dismayed, but I'm not surprised.
None of this surprises me at all.
Not at all.
If you listen to the news, Rose, if you listen to the news, any other station other than a conservative or a Republican station, they're making excuses and thinking this is okay.
And of course, cocaine would be found and blah, blah, blah.
But the reality is, if this was Kennedy or Reagan or take any president in our past.
I've lived through a lot of presidents.
If it were any other president in history, this would be morally a disgrace for our country.
And nobody would say, oh, of course we found cocaine in the White House.
And of course we'll look into it.
No, this is totally unacceptable on every level.
And if they don't know, they should be fired.
In fact, the fact that they don't, they're not reporting by now whose cocaine it is, they should already be fired.
You are delightful, Virginia.
Thank you so much for your call.
I appreciate you, sweetie.
And Linda is calling from Montana.
The phone number here is 1-800-941-Sean.
Linda, you wanted to weigh in on the dementia subject.
Yes, I do.
I've been experiencing some bit of a crisis since 2018 when my husband was admitted to a Montana veterans home.
I have learned through trial and error that the VA, veterans administration, and Social Security do not recognize durable power of returning.
So the documents that I thought I had to be able to advocate for my husband are worth nothing to the VA and Social Security.
They do not recognize them.
From the time someone's 18 years old, they should have all of their important things in place so that whatever their wishes are will be honored.
And that's not the case.
It's been just a disastrous situation, and I'm still muddling through it and waiting for an appeal to see what happens on that.
But it's kind of just a bit of a dismaying situation that just you think you have everything all set only to find out after the fact.
And with someone with dementia or someone who's diagnosed as not competent, whatever that might be on a calendar, from that point on, you've lost all power.
It's very unfortunate, and a lot of people don't know it.
You know, Linda, you bring up a great point.
And first of all, my heart goes out to you, and God bless you.
It is very difficult.
I don't think unless people have gone through it, they have no idea.
No idea.
It is probably one of the most, and listen, I watched a mother die from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma years ago, many, many, many years ago.
She was young, we were young.
And at that time, it really was a death sentence today.
Thank God, you know, you can survive it.
But even that, for as ugly as it was, it lasted nine months or so, and then it was over for dementia patients and those who care for them.
It is a very long, grueling ordeal.
And I'm going to tell you something, Linda.
You bring up a great point and get your paperwork in order, all of you, everybody.
Because for Linda, it's been more difficult for her to take care of someone that she loves because they didn't have the proper paperwork.
So see an elder attorney, talk to someone, talk to others and see what they did, but get it done.
Linda, that probably is some of the most valuable information that you could pass on to anyone right now.
Well, glad to do it.
And if it helps someone not have to go through what I have and continue to go through, I will be blessed and so will they.
So, you know, Linda, there are so many, it's bittersweet, but for all of the sadness, there are so many moments of joy.
And I know you know that.
And you will never regret the time that you're spending with him and caring for him.
And God bless you for that.
Take care, sweetie.
Others.
Yes.
Yes, they need it.
We need it.
In fact, that's one of the things I want to do moving forward is to advocate for those patients because they need it.
They really do.
And so do their caregivers.
God bless you, Linda.
Thank you so much for your call.
This is the Sean Hannity show.
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You've been doing it.
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All right, we'll be back.
My last segment.
I do kind of want to talk about millennials and Gen Zers.
I think it's important and boomers.
I'm on your side, boomers.
All on that.
Coming up next.
This is the Sean Hannity Show.
My name is Rose.
It's been such a blessing to be with you.
And I'm looking at all of the comments on my social media pages and email that you've sent me.
Thank you.
Thank you for your kind words.
And I want you to know that I really do enjoy spending this time with you.
And it goes too fast, I have to tell you.
One of the things I just really wanted to hit before I left, and that was how, you know, millennials are saying that, you know, Gen Z is banning scrolling the phone with their index finger in public because that's for old boomers.
And, you know, they share, they think that we're just so out of touch.
And, you know, boomer, okay, boomer, remember that?
That was so weird.
I don't know.
I thought, I guess they thought it was an insult, but it didn't really bother me at all.
But overall, you hear a lot about baby boomers.
And why are Zoomers so appalled by baby boomers and everything that they do?
You know, they don't like us going through with our index finger.
They don't like the okay sign.
So I, you know what?
I did a little research for you, Zoomers, okay?
And I found this by Karen McCullough, and I love it.
And it's why are baby boomers the best known?
What are baby boomers?
I'm sorry, known for.
And if you go through the list, I mean, first of all, I'm just going to have to do this really quick, but you know, you know, that it refers to people that were born between 1946 and 1964.
Okay.
Now, some of the attributes of a baby boomer, they value relationships.
We've always seen the value of family, and we took that value with us into the workplace.
And boomers are known for the strong business relationships that they created through their decades of work.
And this is all from I love KarenMcCullough.com.
They're highly driven.
They're goal-oriented.
They have a strong work ethic.
They really do.
You know that.
They got things done.
We're self-assured.
We're very competitive in nature.
And that's okay.
That's absolutely okay.
We're competitive in every aspect of our lives, always have been.
We've contributed greatly to society.
We led the charge, by the way, Zoomers, through activism, social change, and freedom.
We opened your eyes to social attitudes.
We did.
And remember, Karen McCullough points out, John F. Kennedy delivered his inaugural address on January 20th, 1961, that inspired a generation of baby boomers, saying, Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.
The Peace Corps came out of our time.
You know what?
We served our country too.
Many served the country.
And it was estimated that 47,434 American fighters were killed during Vietnam.
And we've created an era of hope and optimism.
And we told you when you were growing up that you could do anything that you wanted to do, you could be anyone you wanted to be, that you could live the American dream.
We fought for women's rights, gay rights, civil rights, and social equality.
We did that.
Boomers did that.
You know, and they had an impact on television, consumerism, credit cards.
And we understood that living the American dream required a lot of work.
And we were willing to invest that time and that work in that dream.
It paid off.
For a lot of boomers, it paid off.
And you know that phone that you carry around with you every single day, all day long?
Well, guess what?
That first phone, the very first one that came in a bag and people carried it around in their cars, that was a boomer.
Right?
We're responsible for that.
And guess what, Zoomers?
You will be someone's boomer faster than you know, way faster than you can imagine.
Goes by quickly.
It might be one of the first times that we don't respect those who came before us and their contributions.
Just a little reminder of the contributions that boomers made.
Anyway, love you guys.
Please check me out on social media.
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What a blessing to be with you today.
God bless you.
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