Study finds that dementia rates could be falling

Researchers have suggested that growing evidence is starting to show that the dementia crisis may not be as bad as first feared, with figures falling in the US and UK.

Published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine, data from 21,057 people over the age of 65 in the US showed the proportion with dementia fell from 11.6 per cent in 2000 to 8.8 per cent in 2012.

This echoes the findings of similar studies undertaken in Europe, published in the Lancet Neurology last year, which suggested dementia rates had fallen in the UK and had stabilised in other European countries.

It is believed that higher levels of education are protecting the brain from the disease, with the JAMA Internal Medicine journal also noting that the average time older adults had spent in school or university had increased alongside the dementia drop.

Professor Carol Brayne, from the University of Cambridge, agreed that education appeared to be significant and that people with higher levels of education seemed to ‘defer’ dementia until later in life.

Professor Kenneth Langa, who conducted the latest study at the University of Michigan, said: "Our results add to a growing body of evidence that this decline in dementia risk is a real phenomenon, and that the expected future growth in the burden of dementia may not be as extensive as once thought."

Hilary Evans, the chief executive of Alzheimer's Research UK, said the latest study was a cause for ‘optimism’ but stressed that dementia remained the ‘greatest medical challenge’ we face.