Annals of Neurology<\/a>, the researchers found that while the likelihood of developing dementia does rise if a person has both risk factors, there is a silver lining: The vascular component is within a person\u2019s control, offering a route for minimizing dementia risk even if they have higher genetic risk.<\/p>\n\u201cOur study addressed whether these two known risk factors act additively or multiplicatively to increase the risk of incident all-cause dementia,\u201d says senior author Adam de Havenon, associate professor of neurology at Yale School of Medicine (YSM) .<\/p>\n
\u201cWe wanted to show that controlling vascular risk factors like high blood pressure could prevent harmful brain changes, meaning that even those with bad genetic luck could avoid the worst outcomes.\u201d<\/p>\n
The study used data from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study and the UK Biobank. The team assessed two measures: white matter hyperintensity (WMH) and whether a person was a carrier of the \u03b54 variant of the APOE gene.<\/p>\n
White matter hyperintensity are lesions, or scar tissue, in the brain that show up as bright white spots on magnetic resonance imaging. They\u2019re associated with damage to the small blood vessels in the brain, which can be caused by high blood pressure (hypertension) and can accumulate over time. The APOE gene encodes for a protein involved in transporting fat, such as cholesterol. When people have a certain version of this gene, known as the \u03b54 variant, they carry a higher risk of developing Alzheimer\u2019s disease.<\/p>\n
The researchers found that participants with both high WMH burden and at least one APOE \u03b54 allele faced elevated dementia risk compared to those with neither risk factor. These effects, however, were additive rather than multiplicative, meaning each factor contributed its own risk increase rather than also exacerbating the effect of the other factor.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis tells us something really important,\u201d de Havenon explains. \u201cEven if you\u2019ve been dealt a bad genetic hand with APOE \u03b54, you\u2019re not destined for dementia. The vascular component is modifiable.\u201d<\/p>\n
For instance, the health factors that can contribute to the development of WMH can be prevented or slowed through blood pressure management, diabetes control, and other cardiovascular interventions, he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s really a two-hit scenario,\u201d says de Havenon. \u201cIf you have APOE \u03b54 and you don\u2019t take care of your vascular health, then you\u2019re in a high-risk group. But having the APOE \u03b54 genotype is not a foregone conclusion for developing dementia later in life.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur analysis suggests that while the gene increases risk, the ultimate outcome is highly dependent on other factors. My hope is that people who find out they have this genetic mutation will be very serious about their vascular risk factors.\u201d<\/p>\n
The research reported in this news article was supported by the National Institutes of Health and Yale University. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.<\/p>\n
Source: Yale<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Share this Article You are free to share this article under the Attribution 4.0 International license. Researchers examined…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":207275,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[1911,2926,103,61,60],"class_list":["post-207274","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-blood-pressure","tag-dementia","tag-health","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=207274"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207274\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}