Seniors who read, write and play cards could delay the onset of Alzheimer’s disease by five years.
- The study, which involved nearly 2,000 seniors, shows that, among patients who have developed Alzheimer’s, those who practiced intellectually stimulating activities every day delayed its onset by an average of five years.
- People with the lowest level of cognitive activity developed the disease at age 89, compared to age 94 for other patients who regularly play cards, read and do puzzles.
When you are old, reading, doing puzzles, playing cards or writing letters is not only a way to break loneliness and have fun. It is also a great way to reduce the risk of dementia.
This is highlighted by a new study published in the journal Neurology. According to its authors, keeping your brain active through cognitively stimulating activities could delay the onset of Alzheimer’s disease by five years.
“The good news is that it’s never too late to start doing the kind of inexpensive and accessible activities we looked at in our study, says Robert S. Wilson, of Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. Our results suggest that starting to do these things, even at age 80, may be beneficial for delaying the onset of Alzheimer’s dementia.”
The benefits of cognitively stimulating activities
The study involved 1,978 people with an average age of 80 who did not have dementia at the start of the study, and who were followed for an average of seven years. To determine if they had developed dementia, participants underwent annual checkups, which included a number of cognitive tests.
At the start of the study, participants were asked to rate their participation in seven activities on a 5-point scale. “During the past year, how often have you read books?” or “During the past year, how often have you played games such as checkers, board games, cards or puzzles?”, were among the questions.
The researchers then calculated the average of each person’s responses, with a score of 1 meaning once a year or less and a score of 5 meaning every day or almost. People in the high cognitive activity group had an average score of 4.0, meaning activities several times a week, compared to an average score of 2.1 for people with low cognitive activity, meaning activities several times. times a year.
Activities to practice until late to delay the onset of Alzheimer’s
During the follow-up period of the study, 457 people, with an average age of 89, developed Alzheimer’s disease. Of these, the participants with the highest activity levels developed the disease at age 94. People with the lowest level of cognitive activity developed the disease at age 89, a difference of five years.
“Our study shows that people who engage in more cognitively challenging activities can delay the age at which they develop dementia,” explains Professor Wilson. Importantly, after controlling for level of late-life cognitive activity, neither education nor early-life cognitive activity was associated with the age at which a person developed dementia. of Alzheimer’s. Our research suggests that the link between cognitive activity and the age at which a person developed dementia is primarily determined by the activities you do later in life.”
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