Each study has a usefulness score out of 100 (rubric version 4.0). Tap a score to see what makes it up.
Highest usefulness score first. Studies without a score come last.
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53/100
Compared with white patients, black patients were less likely to have heart failure with preserved systolic function.
Why it matters
This study assessed the prevalence of preserved left ventricular ejection fraction in patients with incident heart failure and found that Black patients were less likely to have heart failure with preserved systolic function. It concerns heart failure and does not test any treatment, cure, or prevention for Alzheimer's disease.
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These data confirm that NPS are risk factors for conversion from CIND to dementia.
Why it matters
In 230 people with cognitive impairment but no dementia, the conversion rate to all-cause dementia was 12% per year, with risk factors including an APOE epsilon 4 allele and lower cognitive scores. The presence of neuropsychiatric symptoms, even mild ones, was also a risk factor for progression to dementia.
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53/100
Several studies have associated physical activity with the risk of dementia, but mostly did so during short follow-up.
Why it matters
This study examined whether physical activity is associated with risk of dementia over up to 14 years of follow-up in an elderly population. It is observational and cannot prove that physical activity prevents dementia.
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The prevalence of dementia in this rural Tanzanian population is similar to that reported in high-income countries.
Why it matters
This study found that the prevalence of dementia in rural Tanzania was 6.4% in people aged 70 and older, similar to rates in high-income countries. It does not test any treatment or prevention, but suggests dementia may become a larger health burden in this population as it ages.
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Physical performance tests are important for assessing the effect of physical activity interventions in older people with dementia, but their psychometric properties have not been systematically established within this specific population.
Why it matters
This study checked how reliably six physical performance tests work when used repeatedly in older people with dementia, covering walking speed, balance, mobility, strength and grip. Reliable tests like these are needed to properly measure whether physical activity interventions help this group.
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For hypertension, CHD, and stroke, there is convincing evidence that increasing the consumption of vegetables and fruit reduces the risk of disease.
Why it matters
This review found convincing evidence that increasing consumption of vegetables and fruit reduces the risk of hypertension, coronary heart disease, and stroke, and probable evidence for reducing cancer risk. It also indicates that higher vegetable and fruit consumption may contribute to the prevention of asthma, COPD, and rheumatoid arthritis, but does not provide strong evidence for dementia prevention.
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According to the vascular depression hypothesis, subclinical cerebrovascular disease can cause depression in older adults.
Why it matters
This study tested the idea that reduced blood flow in the brain might contribute to depression in older adults, a hypothesis linking vascular problems to mood disorders. It measured blood flow velocities and vasomotor reactivity in participants free of depression, dementia, and stroke at the start.
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Our cost model revealed that brain disorders overall are much more costly than previously estimated constituting a major health economic challenge for Europe.
Why it matters
This report estimates that brain disorders cost Europe 798 billion euros in 2010, with dementia accounting for 105.2 billion euros of that total. It is a cost estimate and does not test any treatment, cure, or prevention for Alzheimer's disease.
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Cognitive assessment appropriate for diagnosis of dementia and CIND in large population surveys could be improved with more targeted information from informants and additional cognitive tests targeting other areas of brain function.
Why it matters
This study examined how well cognitive tests from a large population survey predict a detailed dementia diagnosis. It found that the survey tests predicted the diagnosis in 74% of self-respondents and 86% of proxy respondents, and that adding more tests could improve accuracy; this is about assessment methods, not treating or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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AF ablation patients were less likely to have diabetes, but were more likely to have hypertension, HF, and significant valvular heart disease.
Why it matters
In this comparison, patients who had atrial fibrillation ablation had a lower rate of Alzheimer's dementia than AF patients without ablation and a rate similar to people without AF. This is an observational comparison, so it cannot prove that ablation prevents dementia.
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Diagnosis frequency ranged across HRRs from 0.58 chronic conditions in Grand Junction, Colorado, to 1.23 in Miami, Florida (mean, 0.90 [95% confidence interval {CI}, 0.89-0.91]; median, 0.87 [interquartile range, 0.80-0.96]).
Why it matters
This study found that among fee-for-service Medicare beneficiaries, there is an inverse relationship between the regional frequency of diagnoses and the case-fatality rate for chronic conditions. It does not report any treatment, cure, or prevention for Alzheimer's disease.
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Increasing numbers of people are developing type 2 diabetes mellitus, but interventions to prevent and treat the classic microvascular and macrovascular complications have improved, so that people are living longer with the condition.
Why it matters
This review reports that type 2 diabetes is associated with a 1.5- to 2.5-fold higher risk of dementia, and that the reasons are probably multiple, including chronic high blood sugar and possibly severe low blood sugar episodes. It recommends including cognitive function as an outcome in diabetes treatment trials, but reports no proven treatment, cure or prevention for dementia.
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In this large cohort, heavy smoking in midlife was associated with a greater than 100% increase in risk of dementia, AD, and VaD more than 2 decades later.
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Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) is the second most common young-onset dementia and is clinically characterised by progressive behavioural change, executive dysfunction and language difficulties.
Why it matters
This review describes frontotemporal dementia as the second most common young-onset dementia, with 30-50% of cases being familial and mutations in two genes accounting for about half of these cases. Imaging studies have detailed patterns of atrophy associated with different clinical and pathological subtypes, which offer some diagnostic utility, while measures of progression of atrophy may be of use in future trials.
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The neuroprotective effects of estrogen have been demonstrated consistently in cellular and animal studies but the evidence in women remains conflicted.
Why it matters
This review of existing literature and reanalyzed data suggests estrogen's effect on the brain may be beneficial, neutral, or harmful depending on age at treatment, type of menopause, and stage of menopause. It does not establish a treatment or prevention for Alzheimer's disease, and the evidence in women remains conflicted.
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53/100
A high level of drug utilization, influenced by the characteristics of residents and the institution, was observed in Belgian nursing homes.
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However, the largest study to date found nortriptyline therapy to be efficacious compared with placebo, whereas paroxetine controlled release was not.
Why it matters
This review covers treatment options for nonmotor symptoms of Parkinson's disease, including cognitive impairment, depression, and sleep disturbance. It notes that the largest study to date found nortriptyline efficacious compared with placebo, whereas paroxetine controlled release was not.
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WMC severity and diabetes are independent predictors of cognitive decline in an initially nondisabled elderly population.
Why it matters
In this study of independent elderly people with white matter changes, the severity of those changes and having diabetes at baseline each predicted later cognitive decline, including dementia. However, Alzheimer disease specifically was predicted only by medial temporal atrophy, not by white matter changes or diabetes.
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The Seoul Neuropsychological Screening Battery (SNSB) is one of the standardized neuropsychological test batteries widely used in Korea.
Why it matters
This study validated a shorter dementia version of the Seoul Neuropsychological Screening Battery that includes a global cognitive function score. It is a test-validation study for assessing and monitoring cognitive impairment, not a treatment study.
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53/100
Improvements in medical interventions for people with Down's syndrome have led to a substantial increase in their longevity.
Why it matters
This review describes cognitive features and neurological complications in people with Down's syndrome, noting that dementia resembling Alzheimer's disease is common in adults with the condition. It covers diagnosis and management of complications, not a treatment or cure for Alzheimer's disease.
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These findings cross-validate the previously published CDR-SB interpretative guidelines for staging dementia severity and extend those findings to a large heterogeneous sample of patients with dementia.
Why it matters
This study cross-validated previously proposed Clinical Dementia Rating scale Sum of Boxes cut scores in a large national database and found they classified the vast majority of patients accurately. The score also helped distinguish mild cognitive impairment from very early dementia.
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The prevalence of Alzheimer disease (AD) and vascular dementia (VD) increases with advancing age, but less so after age 90 years.
Why it matters
This autopsy study described the relative prevalence of dementia disorders, including Alzheimer disease and vascular dementia, in the oldest-old. It is a postmortem prevalence study and provides no information on treating, curing or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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Thirteen percent of care recipients had at least 1 ACSH.
Why it matters
This study found that community-dwelling veterans with dementia in the most rural counties were more likely to have preventable hospitalizations than those in large metropolitan areas, and this disparity was not explained by caregiver, care recipient or community factors. It does not test a dementia treatment or cure.
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The Cronbach's alpha of MoCA-J as an index of internal consistency was 0.74.
Why it matters
The Japanese version of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment showed internal consistency of 0.74 and test-retest reliability of 0.88 in 96 older subjects, 30 with mild Alzheimer's disease, 30 with mild cognitive impairment and 36 normal controls. The authors conclude it could be a useful cognitive test for screening mild cognitive impairment in primary clinical settings and community health screening, but it is a screening tool, not a treatment or cure.
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Caffeine has well-known short-term stimulating effects on central nervous system, but the long-term impacts on cognition have been less clear.
Why it matters
This review of longitudinal studies reports that most studies supported favorable effects of coffee against cognitive decline, dementia, or Alzheimer's disease, and in the CAIDE study midlife coffee drinking was linked to lower later risk. It is about associations, not proof that caffeine prevents or treats dementia.
From across this topic
10 of the 7,967 studies in this topic, picked by a fixed rule (a hash of each study's address), not by score or date; each page of this list shows a different 10. The same 10 appear here every time.
- Prevalence of dementia in older Japanese-American men in Hawaii: The Honolulu-Asia Aging Study
- Physical activity and risk of cognitive impairment and dementia in elderly persons
- Factors Associated with Atypical Cognitive Trajectories in Older Adults with Down Syndrome
- Evaluating Social Determinants of Health–Based Alternatives to Race-Based Cognitive Normative Models
- Pathological correlates of dementia in a longitudinal, population-based sample of aging
- Prevalence of mixed pathologies in the aging brain
- Scales for evaluation of End-of-Life Care in Dementia
- Navigational Decision‐Making Among Older Drivers: An Analysis of Real‐World Driving Patterns
- Critical appraisal of the health research literature: prevalence or incidence of a health problem
- Profiles of language impairment in primary progressive aphasia