Can you remember this easy way to prevent dementia?

The World Health Organization reported that >55 million people were living with dementia worldwide in 2021. It is a public health nightmare, with an aging population at risk for an incurable condition that will require increasing millions of people to be cared for by loved ones or placed in institutions. Therefore, it is a priority to find not only a cure or treatment (for which Big Pharma is desperately searching), but also preventive strategies so that we can personally avoid the situation and decrease the burden to our population. 

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It is within this framework that two recent investigations of participants in the UK Biobank database are important to publicize. What is the UK Biobank? It is a massive epidemiology study of human health, genomics, and diseases that began recruiting in 2006, and by 2010 had half a million participants 40-69 years of age from across the United Kingdom enrolled. We are now reaping the fruit of that harvest, as every month, new research is being published from analyses of this massive dataset. Two recent studies on the topic of dementia recently caught my eye. 

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One study looked at and confirmed the link between cardiovascular disease and the development of dementia. In this study, the investigators created a model of brain age based on MRIs of the brain magnetic resonance imaging. Brain age was estimated in 7,048 subjects without atherosclerosis (blockages in the heart’s blood vessels or “hardening of the arteries”) and compared to 1,341 participants with atherosclerosis. Patients with atherosclerosis in their hearts had higher “brain ages”, and a 30% higher risk of dementia. Accelerated “brain aging” was also associated with diabetes and 2 indices of obesity. Participants with hardening of the heart’s arteries in this study also had significantly lower volumes of most brain structures (their brains had “shrunk” in size).

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In a second recently published analysis of the UK Biobank dataset, researchers looked at the effects of different healthy dietary patterns in midlife and their relationship to a later diagnosis of dementia. They found that greater adherence to healthy plant-based diets in mid-life was associated with larger brain volumes later in life. 

These two studies taken together tell us a lot about heart disease and dementia. We have definitive evidence that the same risk factors that lead to heart disease also lead to dementia. We know that healthy plant-based dietary patterns can prevent and even reverse atherosclerosis. And now we know that not only is this dietary pattern healthy for the heart, but it can also prevent dementia, as it leads to higher brain volumes as we age. Which is definitely something we all should remember.

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Rauseo et al. JACC Imaging2023 Jul 16 905–915

Zhang et al AJCN 118(1):218-22.

Photo by Robina Weermeijer on Unsplash

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