The 2024 Lancet commission has added vision loss and high cholesterol to the existing 12 modifiable risk factors for dementia, in a new update.
The report published Wednesday in The Lancet also shares 13 recommendations to help people lower their risk for dementia throughout the course of their lives.
Some of the recommendations include preventing depression, vision loss and hearing loss. Using head protection when active, staying cognitively active, and lowering vascular risk factors are also key, as is increasing social contacts.
The two newly added risk factors are linked to 9% of all dementia cases. In fact, about 7% of dementia cases are attributed to high levels of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol in midlife while about 2% of cases are attributed to untreated vision loss in later life.
The Lancet Commission identified 12 modifiable lifestyle factors for dementia in 2020. (These included hearing impairment, smoking, depression, and traumatic brain injury, to name a few.)
The Commission includes 27 world-leading dementia experts, calling for more action in this area.
“Our new report reveals that there is much more that can and should be done to reduce the risk of dementia. It’s never too early or too late to take action, with opportunities to make an impact at any stage of life,” Gill Livingston, a professor from University College London in the United Kingdom.
“Healthy lifestyles that involve regular exercise, not smoking, cognitive activity in midlife (including outside formal education) and avoiding excess alcohol can not only lower dementia risk but may also push back dementia onset. So, if people do develop dementia, they are likely to live less years with it. This has huge quality of life implications for individuals as well as cost-saving benefits for societies,” Livingston added.
The news comes as a report in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society finds that older adults with chronic anxiety — especially those under age 70 — face a significant increase in all-cause dementia.
