Type 2 diabetes linked to higher early dementia risk
Dementia risk was 0.55% versus 0.40% at one year and 8.24% versus 8.45% at 20 years in the diabetes and comparison groups, respectively.
Limit: Groups were not matched for comorbidities like hypertension and ischemic heart disease
Edited by Boris Djordjevic · AgingResearch.News
A Danish observational study compared 371,677 adults aged 18 or older with type 2 diabetes and no dementia with 743,426 people without diabetes or dementia. Researchers identified the diabetes group in nationwide registries between 1998 and 2018. They matched the groups by age, sex and date, then followed participants until a registered dementia diagnosis, death or the end of 2023.
Over a median follow-up of 11.05 years, 67,069 dementia cases occurred. The analysis accounted for death before a dementia diagnosis. Dementia risk was higher in the diabetes group at one and five years, but not at 20 years. When researchers analyzed risk by age, the groups’ risk curves crossed at age 80. Death rates were consistently higher in the diabetes group.
Why it matters
Understanding dementia risk in people with type 2 diabetes calls for long-term research that considers both cognitive outcomes and survival.
Caveats
This observational study cannot establish causation, and it measured registered dementia diagnoses. The report was an ESC Congress abstract, and the population comprised adults in Denmark.
The paper
Dementia in patients with type 2 diabetes: a nationwide Danish study
