Dementia Cases Declining Due to Improved Healthcare and Lifestyle

Improvements in the education levels, healthcare and lifestyles have led to a drop in the prevalence of dementia, confirms a latest study.

The study reported in the New England journal of Medicine notices a positive trend in dementia. After analyzing five studies conducted earlier, the researchers observed a decrease in the prevalence of dementia acknowledging this drop to improvements in healthcare, lifestyle and education levels.

The study researchers attribute the decreased risk of dementia to two key factors. One is that people are completing more years of schooling and this assumedly helps the brain stave off dementia. Secondly, the level of awareness and focus in preventing heart diseases remains high in people-heart disorders are a big risk factor for Alzheimer's.

"We're very encouraged to see a growing number of studies from around the world that suggest that the risk of dementia may be falling due to rising levels of education and better prevention and treatment of key cardiovascular risk factors such as high blood pressure and cholesterol," says co-author Kenneth Langa, M.D., Ph.D., a professor of Internal Medicine at the U-M Medical School.  "Our findings suggest that, even if we don't find a cure for Alzheimer's disease and dementia, there are social and lifestyle factors we can address to decrease our risk."

The researchers state that currently people are less susceptible to dementia and Alzheimer's disease than they were 20 years ago and the disorders are appearing increasingly at later stages of life.

"The growing number of older adults in the U.S. and around the world means we will undoubtedly see a significant growth in the number of people with dementia, however the good news is they appear to be living longer without experiencing it," says Langa, who is also a member of the U-M Institute for Social Research. "We are seeing a positive trend that suggests that improving our physical and mental health go hand in hand with fighting off this devastating condition."

Earlier in 2008, Langa and Eric B. Larson, M.D., M.P.H., executive director of Group Health Research Institute and Group Health's vice president for research, had conducted a study using data from the U.S. Health and Retirement Study. On analyzing the data they noticed a steady decline in the dementia rate across U.S. and they also noticed that the decline was due to rise in the educational levels and improvement in lifestyle and healthcare.

This was one of the first studies to present the correlation. Afterwards this trend was presented by several studies.

Other contributing factors noticed by the researchers were later retirement ages, greater physical and social activities and better parental education levels.