One in ten cigarette smokers in their 40s suffer from cognitive decline

According to a study, smoking cigarettes can lead to cognitive decline in a person in their 40s.

A study of 136,018 participants over the age of 45 by a team of Ohio State University (OSU) found that 10% of middle-aged or older smokers suffer from memory loss and confusion. Overall, smokers were twice as likely to experience brain problems as their peers.

Getting rid of the bad habit can stop the decline. Former smokers who quit more than a decade ago had a 50% increased risk of brain problems, half that of current smokers.

Cognitive problems are rare in middle-aged people, as the brain does not begin to lose its functions until after age 65 in most cases. However, smoking has been linked to many significant health problems later in life, such as Alzheimer’s and cancer among others. Women are also more likely to suffer from cognitive decline only men.

Researchers have found that smoking can lead to cognitive decline as young as 45 (file photo)

Smoking has long been linked to an increased risk of developing cognitive disorders like Alzheimer’s disease, but the presentation of these problems in middle-aged people is rare.

For their research, published in the Alzheimer’s Disease Journalthe researchers asked a sample of almost 140,000 people about their smoking habits and their feelings of having suffered memory loss during this period.

They found that eight percent of people who had never smoked in their life had cognitive decline.

Meanwhile, 16% of current smokers reported suffering from brain problems and memory loss.

Many of these smokers were of an age considered too young to deal with these problems.

Just under 10% of participants aged 45-49 reported brain problems in the survey – the researchers noting that these affected almost all smokers.

The rate of reported cognitive problems was similar among survey participants in their 50s.

However, the differences in cognitive decline between smokers and non-smokers had largely diminished with age, since at this stage many people develop diseases like Alzheimer’s disease and dementia for a variety of reasons.

What is Alzheimer’s disease?

Alzheimer’s disease is a progressive and degenerative disease of the brain, in which the accumulation of abnormal proteins leads to the death of nerve cells.

This disrupts the transmitters that carry the messages and causes the brain to shrink.

More than 5 million people suffer from the disease in the United States, where it is the 6th leading cause of death, and more than a million Britons have it.

WHAT HAPPENS?

When brain cells die, the functions they perform are lost.

This includes memory, orientation, and the ability to think and reason.

The progression of the disease is slow and progressive.

On average, patients live five to seven years after diagnosis, but some may live ten to 15 years.

FIRST SYMPTOMS:

• Short term memory loss
• disorientation
• Behavioral changes
• Mood swings
• Difficulties managing money or making a phone call

LATER SYMPTOMS:

• Severe memory loss, forgetting close family members, familiar objects or places
• Become anxious and frustrated with the inability to make sense of the world, leading to aggressive behavior
• Eventually loses the ability to walk
• May have food issues
• The majority will eventually need round-the-clock care

Source: Alzheimer Association

“The association we found was most significant in the 45-59 age group, suggesting that quitting smoking at this stage of life may have a beneficial effect on cognitive health,” said said Dr. Jeffrey Wing, lead author of the study and professor of epidemiology at OSU.

Quitting smoking can, however, undo some of the damage. About 12% of survey participants who quit more than a decade ago reported cognitive problems.

This is still a 50% increase over the reference group of non-smokers, a significant decrease over non-smokers.

People who had quit in the last ten years had a 13% risk of developing the disease, slightly higher than people who had quit for a long time.

“These findings could imply that time since quitting is important and may be related to cognitive outcomes,” said Jenna Rajczyk, a doctoral student at OSU who led the research.

“This is a simple assessment that could easily be done routinely, and at a younger age we typically start to see cognitive declines that rise to the level of a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease or dementia. “, she continued.

It’s not an intensive battery of questions. It’s more of a personal reflection of your cognitive state to determine if you feel like you’re not as sharp as you used to be.

The study only took self-reported examples of cognitive problems and did not collect any data on the clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease or dementia.

Signs of the devastating disease often begin to appear decades before the patient is able to receive a diagnosis, and it is rare for a middle-aged person to be told by a doctor that they have the disease. disease.

Alzheimer’s disease is the leading cause of dementia in the United States. It affects approximately 6.5 million Americans aged 65 and older.

The number of Americans with this disease is expected to double over the next 20 years, as a longer lifespan will lead to more cases over time.

There is no known cure for the disease and treatments available to slow the progression of the disease are rare.