It seems that something we suspected all along is probably true - dancing is good exercise for your brain as well as your body.

In a recent study by the Albert Einstein Center in the Bronx, N.Y., dancing was the only regular physical exercise associated with a significant decrease in the incidence of dementia, including Alzheimer's disease.

The researchers postulate that dancing requires as much mental effort as it does physical effort - something you don't see in other purely physical kinds of exercise.

Among those who took part in the study, those who danced three or four times a week showed significantly less incidence of dementia than those who danced once a week or not at all. In the same study purely physical exercise - things like swimming, bicycling, walking, climbing stairs - had no measurable preventive value.

While the numbers involved in the study were small - only 500 - and the intent was to prevent or delay Alzheimer's type dementia, the results of this research seem to bear out what others have seen so often.  Even those who already have dementia can still two-step, even when verbal skills have flown and walking seems to be an effort.

Somehow, the combination of familiar music and a partner can bring back, for a little while, the loved ones we thought were lost.  One distinguished gentleman who seems to prove the point rarely talks much any more, and he needs a lot of help every day. But when the music starts each Wednesday, he's the first one to find a partner on the dance floor at his residence.

Any excuse that works to drag a husband onto the dance floor is a winner!