Note: Single-source report; awaiting corroboration.
A research team led by Dr. Josef Coresh at New York University Grossman School of Medicine analyzed data from over 12,000 participants across four U.S. communities collected over three decades to examine how midlife vascular risk factors affect dementia onset and lifespan. The study focused on participants without dementia at age 55 during the early 1990s, evaluating their smoking status, blood pressure, and diabetes presence at that time.
The findings, published in Neurology Open Access, indicated that individuals without any vascular risk factors lived about 30 years beyond age 55 without developing dementia. In contrast, those with three risk factors lived an average of 17 dementia-free years. Overall, more vascular risk factors were associated with fewer dementia-free years and a greater risk of developing dementia or dying without dementia.
The study also identified demographic differences: women had 1.5 to 3 more dementia-free years than men with the same number of vascular risk factors, while Black participants experienced about three fewer dementia-free years compared to other groups.
These results suggest that addressing vascular health—specifically smoking cessation, blood pressure management, and diabetes control—in midlife may help extend dementia-free life expectancy.