Many received ideas circulate about dementia, a syndrome which affects approximately 50 million people in the world according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Dementia corresponds to a progressive deterioration of cognitive functions: little by little, memory, reasoning ability, orientation, ability to understand, ability to learn, mental calculation, language, judgement, etc. are altered.
Several diseases can cause dementia: most often, this syndrome (which mainly affects the elderly) is caused by Alzheimer’s disease or by a cerebrovascular accident (CVA). In addition, certain factors increase the risk of developing dementia with age: this is particularly the case of smoking, physical inactivity, excessive alcohol consumption or social isolation.
It only takes one head injury to increase the risk of dementia by 25%
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine (in the United States) have just identified a new risk factor for dementia: they claim that a head injury, even a very old one, would increase the risk of developing this syndrome later in life.
To reach this surprising conclusion, American scientists followed a group of 14,376 participants for 25 years. They found that people with a head injury had a 1.25 times higher than average risk of developing dementia 25 years later; for people with 2 or more head injuries, the risk was even multiplied by 2.
According to the researchers, 9.5% of the cases of dementia identified among the volunteers were thus attributable to head trauma. In addition, they believe that women are at greater risk than men of dementia following a head injury. “Of course, head injuries are not the only risk factor for dementia: it is, however, a factor on which we can act by protecting ourselves when playing sports, for example.” underline the scientists who published their work in the specialized journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia.
Source:World Health Organization (WHO)
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