{"id":356679,"date":"2026-03-31T10:48:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T10:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/356679\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T10:48:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T10:48:08","slug":"severe-infection-tied-to-increased-dementia-risk-emj","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/356679\/","title":{"rendered":"Severe Infection Tied to Increased Dementia Risk \u2013 EMJ"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>SEVERE infections are linked to a higher <a href=\"https:\/\/www.emjreviews.com\/diabetes\/news\/type-1-diabetes-tied-to-threefold-increase-in-dementia-risk\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">dementia risk<\/a>, a 2026 Finnish study has found.<\/p>\n<p>Researchers identified nearly 30 hospital-treated infections, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.emjreviews.com\/urology\/news\/one-in-three-europeans-cannot-identify-cystitis-study-warns\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">cystitis<\/a>, tied to an increased dementia risk.<\/p>\n<p>Severe Infection and Dementia Risk<\/p>\n<p>It has previously been established that people who experience severe infections are at a higher risk of developing dementia.<\/p>\n<p>However, it has been unclear as to whether the relevant association is due to comorbidities that predispose the patient to both infections and dementia.<\/p>\n<p>Researchers found that severe infections are independently associated with a higher dementia risk.<\/p>\n<p>Register-Based Finnish Study<\/p>\n<p>Authors analysed more than 62,500 people aged 65 or older in Finland in 2016, who were diagnosed with late-onset dementia between 2017 and 2020.<\/p>\n<p>They also included a control group of more than 312,700 participants without dementia, matched for year of birth, sex, and follow-up period.<\/p>\n<p>Analyses were also adjusted for education, marital status, employment, and area of residence.<\/p>\n<p>Researchers identified nearly 30 hospital-treated diseases that occurred 1\u201321 years before dementia diagnosis and were significantly associated with an approximately 20% higher risk of dementia.<\/p>\n<p>Identified Diseases Tied to Higher Dementia Risk<\/p>\n<p>Authors identified two relevant infectious diseases tied to heightened risk: cystitis and bacterial infection of an unspecified site.<\/p>\n<p>Beyond infectious disease, 27 mental, behavioural, digestive, endocrine, cardiometabolic, neurological, and eye diseases, as well as injuries were similarly associated.<\/p>\n<p>Almost half the people with dementia had at least one of the relevant diseases diagnosed before onset.<\/p>\n<p>Notably, the associations of the two infectious diseases with increased dementia risk were not attributable to the 27 comorbid dementia-related diseases.<\/p>\n<p>After adjustment for comorbidities, people with cystitis had a 22% higher chance of dementia.<\/p>\n<p>People with bacterial infections at an unspecified site had a 19% increased risk.<\/p>\n<p>Findings were comparable across sex and education subgroups, and the association was stronger in cases of early onset dementia, researchers reported.<\/p>\n<p>Reference<\/p>\n<p>Sipil\u00e4 P N et al. The role of noninfectious comorbidities in the association between severe infections and risk of dementia in Finland: A nationwide registry study. PLoS Med. 2026;DOI:10.1371\/journal.pmed.1004688.<\/p>\n<p>Featured image: amazing studio on Adobe Stock<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SEVERE infections are linked to a higher dementia risk, a 2026 Finnish study has found. Researchers identified nearly&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":356680,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[134,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-356679","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-new-zealand","10":"tag-newzealand","11":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=356679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356679\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/356680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=356679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=356679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=356679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}