A major population study of women in Gothenburg, Sweden, which was carried out over 35 years, suggests that stress in midlife could lead to the development of late-life dementia.The research, recently published in Brain, used a representative sample of women who were first examined in 1968-1969, aged between 38 and 60, and were then re-examined in 1974-1975,1980-1981,1992-1993 and 2000-2003. Psychological stress was rated according to a standardized question answered by 1415 women in the 1968,1974 and 1980 surveys.A total of 161 participants developed dementia during the 35-year study period (105 patients were diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, 40 with vascular dementia and 16 patients developed other types of dementia). The study found that the risk of dementia was approximately 65 higher in women who had repeatedly reported stress during their middle age when answering the surveys, than in those women who did not report stress.
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