A pretty scary study published in the journal, Diabetes, concluded that if you really want to minimize your risk of diabetes and other common forms of dementia as you age, then you’d best avoid developing Type 2 diabetes, especially in middle age, that is, before you turn 65.
This quite persuasive study of nearly 14,000 Scandinavian twins found that the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia (including the second most common form of dementia, known as vascular dementia) was 125 % higher in those twins who developed Type 2 diabetes before the age of 65 when compared to twins who didn’t get Type 2 diabetes at all, or even those who ended up with Type 2 diabetes as they entered their seventies.
Why?
Well, it could be, as some argue, that the same prenatal and early life factors that lead to eventually higher rates of heart disease and Type 2 diabetes are also the same early-life factors that lead to eventual higher risks of dementia, too, in which case there’s really very little you can do as an adult to alter that course.
Or, much more likely, I think, it could be that the same controllable factors in life – exercise, smoking, weight, diet, etc – that raise the risk of Type 2 diabetes also raise the risks of all forms of dementia, in which case, there’s a hell of a lot you can – and should – do to change that course.
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