Researchers from Baycrest Center for Geriatric Care found that staving off each lifestyle associated dementia risks can improve cognitive ability by three years each.

The study, published in Alzheimer’s & Dementia: Diagnosis, Assessment, and Disease Monitoring, of 22,1176 people between the ages of 18 to 89 years old who completed the Cogniciti Brain Health Assessment that included some background questioning and cognitive performance tests.

The researchers compared at the participants’ memory and attention performance tests to how eight modifiable risk factors impacted their results. These eight modifiable risk factors included: low education (less than a high school degree), hearing loss, traumatic brain injury, alcohol and other substance abuse, hypertension, smoking history, diabetes, and depression.

They found that the presence of each of these factors can decrease cognitive performance by up to three years. For example, having two factors was equivalent to six additional years of aging, or having three factors was the equivalent of up to 9 additional years of brain aging. In other words, no matter what your age is in your elderly years, not having any of these risk modifiable lifestyle risk factors can make you up to 24 years younger cognitively.

The Cogniciti Brain Health Assessment can be found here (https://cogniciti.com).

AA LaPlume et al. The adverse effect of modifiable dementia risk factors on cognition amplifies across the adult lifespan. Alzheimer’s & Dementia: Diagnosis, Assessment & Disease Monitoring. DOI: 10.1002/dad2.12337