
Research
Roundup: Falls Among Older Adults Linked to Higher Risk of Future Dementia Diagnoses; and More News
4 min. read
Written By: John Fernandez
Published: October 4, 2024
Written By: John Fernandez
Published: October 4, 2024
Study on Injuries: Older Adults Who Experience a Fall are More Likely to be Diagnosed with Dementia
In a study involving Medicare claims data on more than 2 million older adults, researchers found that dementia was more frequently diagnosed within one year of a fall, compared to other types of injuries.
Falls were associated with a 21 percent increased risk for future dementia diagnosis, according to researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital, a founding member of the Mass General Brigham healthcare system. The findings were published this week in JAMA Network Open.
More than 14 million older adults, or one in four, report falls each year, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). And falls are also the leading cause of injury in older adults.
“These injuries can have long-lasting or permanent consequences, including declines in functional status, overall loss of independence or risk of death,” states a news release on the study.
Fall injuries can also be associated with cognitive decline in older adults, as motor function loss is a frequent precursor of cognitive decline and dementia.
“To improve the early identification of dementia, the researchers recommend implementing cognitive screenings in older adults who experience an injurious fall that results in either an emergency department visit or admission to the hospital,” states the news release from Brigham and Women’s Hospital.
“Cognitive decline can increase the likelihood of falls, but trauma from those falls may also accelerate dementia's progression and make a diagnosis more likely down the line,” said senior study author Molly Jarman, PhD, MPH, assistant professor in the Department of Surgery and deputy director of the Center for Surgery and Public Health at the Brigham, in a statement. “Thus, falls may be able to act as precursor events that can help us identify people who need further cognitive screening.”
Learn about Baptist Health Brain & Spine Care’s Memory Disorders Program.
‘Weekend Warrior’ Physical Activity can be as Effective at Cutting Risk of Diseases as Daily Exercise
Physical activity commonly follows a “weekend warrior” pattern if most moderate-to-vigorous exercise is concentrated in one or two days, rather than spread more evenly across the week as guidelines recommend.
However, this “weekend warrior” pattern of exercise is linked to a lower risk of developing 264 future diseases -- and was just as effective at decreasing risk as more evenly distributed exercise activity, according to new research published in Circulation.
“Because there appears to be similar benefits for weekend warrior versus regular activity, it may be the total volume of activity, rather than the pattern, that matters most,” said co-senior author Shaan Khurshid, M.D., MPH, a faculty member in the Demoulas Center for Cardiac Arrhythmias at Massachusetts General Hospital, in a statement.
Researchers analyzed information on 89,573 individuals in the prospective U.K. Biobank study. The study participants wore wrist accelerometers that recorded their total physical activity and time spent at different exercise intensities over one week.
Participants’ physical activity patterns were categorized as weekend warrior, regular, or inactive, using the U.S. guideline-based standard of 150 minutes per week of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity.
The team of investigators at Massachusetts General Hospital, a founding member of the Mass General Brigham healthcare system, then looked for associations between physical activity patterns and incidence of 678 conditions across 16 types of diseases, including mental health, digestive, neurological, and other categories.
Their findings, according to a news release on the study: Weekend warrior and regular physical activity patterns were each associated with substantially lower risks of more than 200 diseases -- compared with inactivity.
States the news release from researchers: “Associations were strongest for cardiometabolic conditions such as hypertension (23 percent and 28 percent lower risks over a median of six years with weekend warrior and regular exercise, respectively) and diabetes (43 percent and 46 percent lower risks, respectively). However, associations also spanned all disease categories tested.”
Researchers: Several Species of Bacteria in Gum Disease Linked to Higher Risk of Head & Neck Cancers
More than a dozen types of bacteria among the hundreds that live in a person’s mouth may be linked to a collective 50 percent increased risk of developing head and neck cancers, according to new research which strongly reiterates the importance of oral health.
Some of these microbes had already been shown to contribute to periodontal disease, which entails serious gum infections that can eat away soft tissues surrounding teeth. Experts have also already observed that those with poor oral health are statistically more vulnerable to other serious conditions, including head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC).
But previous studies have not determined the exact bacterial types most involved until now, according to authors of the new study led by researchers at NYU Langone Health and its Perlmutter Cancer Center. The new research looked at the genetic makeup of oral microbes collected from healthy men and women.
“Of the hundreds of different bacteria that are routinely found in the mouth, 13 species were shown to either raise or lower risk of HNSCC,” states a news release on the study from NYU Langone Health. “Overall, this group was linked to a 30 percent greater likelihood of developing the cancers. In combination with five other species that are often seen in gum disease, the overall risk was increased by 50 percent.”
Previous investigations had uncovered certain bacteria in tumor samples of people already diagnosed with these cancers, explains study lead author Soyoung Kwak, PhD., a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Population Health and its Division of Epidemiology at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, in a statement.
“These bacteria may serve as biomarkers for experts to flag those at high risk,” added Dr. Kwak.
The new study was published in the journal JAMA Oncology.Healthcare that Cares
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