Diabetes Significantly Increases Dementia Risk

Individuals with diabetes have a significantly higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia, a new study finds. The study, carried out by Japanese researchers, was published Tuesday in the journal Neurology.

Participants in the study were part of a broader prospective study of heart disease and stroke based in the Japanese town of Hisayama that began in 1961. In 1988, a subset of the broader study’s participants was given a glucose tolerance test to determine whether they had diabetes. At the time, all participants were aged 60 and older and did not have dementia. Over the next 15 years, 1,017 participants were monitored for signs of dementia.

The results found that, after adjusting for other risk factors, participants who had diabetes at the beginning of the study were twice as likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease and 74% more likely to develop all forms of dementia.

Sources

Diabetes May Significantly Increase Your Risk of Dementia [Press Release]

Glucose tolerance status and risk of dementia in the community [Neurology]