Improvements in science, medicine, and lifestyle factors have allowed people to live longer than ever—but the longer you live, the more your risk of dementia increases. Recently, scientists discovered that the number of Americans who will develop dementia—a progressive decline in memory, thinking skills, communication, and overall cognitive ability—is estimated to double from 514,000 new cases each year in 2020 to one million cases each year by 2060.
Thankfully, there are steps you can take to lower your risk of developing dementia. As a 2024 report published in The Lancet found, nearly half of dementia cases could be prevented or delayed by addressing 14 risk factors—including hearing impairment, smoking, obesity, social isolation, and high blood pressure. A massive new study published in Nature Medicine found that even just addressing high blood pressure could reduce your risk of dementia by 15%.
“These findings provide hope,” the authors wrote in The Lancet. “The potential for prevention is high and, overall, nearly half of dementias could theoretically be prevented by eliminating these 14 risk factors.”
Here are the 14 risk factors you should be paying attention to—at any age.
- High cholesterol
- Vision loss
- Lower levels of education
- Hearing impairment
- High blood pressure
- Smoking
- Obesity
- Depression
- Physical inactivity
- Diabetes
- Excessive alcohol consumption
- Traumatic brain injury
- Air pollution
- Social isolation
Tips to tackle all 14 risk factors
Researchers emphasize that interventions should happen as early in life as possible. But some, such as ensuring a good quality education, can be difficult to control on your own—which is why they say policy changes could be crucial to help decrease dementia cases. Such policy shifts could include providing more green space to encourage people to be physically active, or improving education to support cognitive development, or better educating people about the risks of smoking and limiting smoking in public spaces.
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The authors also suggest taking these steps:
- Engage in cognitively stimulating activities throughout your life to maintain strong thinking and intellect.
- Use hearing aids if you suffer from hearing loss.
- Decrease harmful noise exposure to reduce hearing loss.
- Use helmets and head protection in contact sports and on bicycles to prevent traumatic brain injuries.
- Exercise regularly—those who engage in sports and workout frequently are less likely to develop dementia.
- Reduce cigarette smoking or stop entirely.
- Prevent or reduce high blood pressure and maintain systolic blood pressure of 130 or less after age 40.
- Stay on top of your cholesterol, and work to lower your LDL (bad) cholesterol.
- Maintain a healthy weight and treat obesity as early as possible—which can also help prevent diabetes.
- Reduce alcohol consumption.
- Participate in community activities or try to live with others to reduce social isolation.
- Get vision screenings and seek treatment for vision loss.
- Understand your exposure to air pollution and try to reduce where possible.
- Seek help to treat depression.
For more on dementia:
- It’s not just forgetfulness: 8 early warning signs of dementia
- Screen time may harm teens—but for people over 50, it has a surprising bonus
- The shingles vaccine could be the next best tool to prevent dementia, new study finds
- Marriage has a surprising link to dementia risk, new study finds
