A team of researchers at Yonsei Severance Hospital said they discovered six key cardiovascular health (CVH) metrics to reduce dementia risk in a recent study.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), dementia is the deterioration in cognitive function which affects memory, thinking, orientation, comprehension, calculation, learning capacity, language, and judgement, and is usually accompanied by ageing. This syndrome results from a variety of diseases and injuries that affect the brain, such as Alzheimer's disease or stroke.
The research team selected 191,013 participants aged 65 years or more without prior dementia or cerebrovascular diseases who had check-ups between 2004 and 2012, from the National Health Insurance Service of Korea-Senior database.
The researchers divided the participants into three groups -- low, moderate and high -- based on their management of the six CVH metrics -- total cholesterol, fasting plasma glucose, blood pressure, body mass index (BMI], smoking, and exercise. The low group had zero to two CVH status, moderate, three to four, and high, five to six.
The study, led by Professor Joung Bo-young of the Division of Cardiology at Severance Hospital, showed that the risk of dementia in the CVH high group was 64 percent lower than in the low group with only two or less. In the moderate group where only three or four indicators were properly managed, the risk of dementia was 19 percent lower than that of the group with two or less.
The study pointed out three main findings. First, time-dependent moderate and high measures of CVH metrics were associated with lower risks of dementia including Alzheimer’s and vascular disease. Second, the risk of dementia decreased with the increasing number of optimal CVH metrics. Third, among individual CVH metrics, physical activity had the strongest association with the risk of dementia.
Specifically, if you did 150 minutes or more of moderate-intensity exercise per week, the risk of dementia declined by up to 30 percent.
"Considering the absence of an effective treatment for dementia, identifying modifiable risk factors for dementia plays an important role in preventing dementia.” said Joung.
The study was published in the latest issue of the international academic journal, Scientific Reports.