A recently published study indicated that if diabetes goes left untreated, the likelihood of Alzheimer’s disease or another type of dementia developing is much higher than if the diabetes were treated. This has led researchers to believe that diabetes treatment might be beneficial to those who are at risk of Alzheimer’s disease or who already have it, even if there are not necessarily diabetic conditions involved.
This study looked at the rate of development of Alzheimer’s disease in diabetes patients, and is believed to be the first major study that took this approach. Unfortunately, the findings were pretty strong when comparing the relationship between the two. They looked at tau pathology, which is what the tangles or protein deposits in the brain are often referred to. These protein deposits are the defining feature of Alzheimer’s disease, but usually cannot be detected until the brain is looked at after the individual with the disease passes away. These proteins disrupt the signals between brain cells and the end result is the cognitive decline that is the hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease.
Their research led them to believe that people who had diabetes that went untreated developed Alzheimer’s disease at a rate 1.6 times more quickly than those who had received treatment for their diabetes. One of the difficulties that they came across was a lack of data. For some, they could only gather as little as one year’s worth of data. For others, they could find ten years’ worth of information. This led to scattered results, which the researchers attempted to take into account in their conclusions.
Based out of the University of Southern California, these researchers published their findings in the journal Diabetes Care early in March.
The connection between Alzheimer’s and diabetes has long been noted. Many scientists refer to Alzheimer’s as Type III diabetes just because they do share so many similarities when it comes to how the two diseases impact the brain. It’s unclear how diabetes treatments will impact those with Alzheimer’s, but without Type I or II diabetes.
Diabetes can be scary to deal with. Luckily, medicine has improved a lot over the last several years and living with diabetes is not necessarily a huge inconvenience. Yes, there are some lifestyle changes that need to be made when someone has diabetes, but after some time, these can be more easily managed.
When a loved one is struggling with diabetes or another health concern, finding the appropriate senior care can be a big help for the entire family. Sometimes people are reluctant to use a professional caregiver, but they are able to relieve a lot of the stress and burden that caring for an elderly loved one entails.
If you have questions about this, give us a call or an email–whatever is easiest for you. One of our trained care professionals will help you walk through the care process to ensure that your older family members have the care and supervision that they need to stay as healthy and happy as possible, regardless of the health conditions that they face.
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