People who are more relaxed, calm and not easily stressed are less likely to develop dementia in old age, a new study shows. The risk was also lower for relaxed people who were not socially active.

 

The study, conducted by Dr Hui-Xin, from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, and colleagues, adds to a growing number of studies suggesting a link between lifestyle and Alzheimer’s disease.

 

The researchers enrolled 506 older people without dementia who were taking part in the Kungsholmen Project, Stockholm, Sweden. The participants were followed for an average of 6 years. During this interval, 144 developed dementia. The participants were given questionnaires about their personality traits and lifestyle habits.

 

The study found that people who were relaxed and self satisfied had a 50% lower risk of developing dementia. On the other hand, those who were stressed and emotionally instable, with frequent nervous reactions were 50% more likely to develop dementia compared to the other group.

According to estimates of the National Institute of Aging, Alzheimer’s disease currently affects between 2.4 million and 4.5 million Americans. The situation could get worse as the population ages unless people learn how to protect themselves from the effects of stress. 

Alzheimer’s is a terminal and degenerative disease for which there is no known cure. The most commonly symptom is memory loss, as well as difficulty to remember recently learned facts. Sometimes, the condition could not be diagnosed for years. The best way to reduce the risk of dementia is to try to be calm and relaxed, eat a balanced diet, to exercise regularly and to give up smoking and drinking, which influence the development of the Alzheimer’s.

 

“In the past, studies have shown that chronic distress can affect parts of the brain, such as the hippocampus, possibly leading to dementia,” Dr. Hui-Xin Wang of the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, lead-author of the study, said. “But our findings suggest that having a calm and outgoing personality in combination with a socially active lifestyle may decrease the risk of developing dementia even further,” he added.

“The good news is, lifestyle factors can be modified as opposed to genetic factors which cannot be controlled. But these are early results, so how exactly mental attitude influences risk for dementia is not clear,” the researchers noted.

 

According to a report published late last year in the American Journal of Human Genetics, researchers with the Alzheimer’s Genome Project have identified four novel genes that may significantly influence risk for the most common late-onset form of the Alzheimer’s disease. Until now, only one gene had been identified as a likely culprit –APOE4. The researchers found the strongest association between Alzheimer’s age-of-onset and a novel chromosome 14 gene, a gene that is also in the vicinity of the presenilin-1 gene, which is an early-onset Alzheimer’s disease gene.

There is no cure for dementia. Current drugs can delay the symptoms slightly, but they cannot cure it. Late-onset Alzheimer’s accounts for about 95 percent of all cases.