Aged 65 or older | More steps, better brains

Definition: "An ergogenic aid is any substance or phenomenon that enhances performance "

10.03.2023

For every 1420 meters that people over 65 walk daily, their chance of developing dementia or a decline in their mental abilities decreases by 33 percent. This is the conclusion of an American study that will soon be published in Alzheimer's & Dementia.

Study

Steve Nguyen, an epidemiologist from the University of California San Diego, analyzed data from 1,277 women. The data had been collected in the Women's Health Initiative study.

In 2012-2014, the women were 63 or older and healthy. They had worn smart devices that allowed the researcher to determine fairly precisely how much the women exercised every day. Nguyen then followed the women into 2020, determining which of them doctors diagnosed with some form of dementia or mental deterioration. This happened to roughly twenty percent of the women.

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Results

After Nguyen had smoothed out the effect of age, ethnicity, education, smoking, alcohol, diabetes, blood pressure, APOE genes, physical health and quality of life, he saw that a lifestyle with a relatively high level of exercise reduced the risk of dementia by tens of percent.

In the figure below, Nguyen divided the women into 4 roughly even groups, based on the number of minutes that the women engaged in moderate-intensity physical activity each day. There was a tendency that as the women engaged in moderate-intensity exercise for more minutes, their risk of dementia decreased.

Click on the figure for a larger version.

Nguyen was able to calculate that for every half hour of moderate-intensity exercise a day, the risk of dementia and mental decline was reduced by 21 percent.

Nguyen found stronger connections for the number of steps the women took each day. For every 1,865 steps or 1,420 meters that the women walked daily, the risk of dementia and cognitive decline was reduced by 33 percent.

Nguyen found no effect of sitting on dementia or the risk of cognitive impairment.

Conclusion
"Given that the onset of dementia begins 20 years or more before symptoms show, the early intervention for delaying or preventing cognitive decline and dementia among older adults is essential", says study leader Angela LaCroix in a press release. [sciencedaily.com January 25, 2023]

"Physical activity has been identified as one of the three most promising ways to reduce risk of dementia and Alzheimer's disease. Prevention is important because once dementia is diagnosed, it is very difficult to slow or reverse. There is no cure."

"Older adults can be encouraged to increase movement of at least moderate intensity and take more steps each day for a lower risk of mild cognitive impairment and dementia", continues first author Steve Nguyen.

"The findings for steps per day are particularly noteworthy because steps are recorded by a variety of wearable devices increasingly worn by individuals and could be readily adopted."

Source:
Alzheimers Dement. 2023 Jan 25. doi: 10.1002/alz.12908. Online ahead of print.

More:
Little bit of physical activity protects the brain against hereditary form of Alzheimer's 07.10.2018
Physical activity enables the brain to repair itself and rejuvenate itself 08.06.2018
High fitness in middle age reduces the chance of dementia by ninety percent 18.03.2018

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