Karin Modig from the Karolinska Institutet and colleagues conducted a case-control study and found that taking common medications for cardiovascular disease is associated with a reduced incidence of dementia. The analysis included 88,065 patients from national health registries who were diagnosed with dementia at the age of 70 or older between 2011 and 2016, and ten times more age- and gender-matched people without this diagnosis. Prescriptions for cardiac drugs were tracked using a prescription register. The results are published in the journal Alzheimer's & Dementia.
It turned out that long-term (five years or more) use of antihypertensive drugs, diuretics, lipid-lowering drugs and oral anticoagulants is associated with a significantly lower risk of developing dementia: the odds ratio (OR) was 0.75–0.91. At the same time, with the use of antiplatelet agents, the risk was higher (OR 1.13–1.25). The greatest reduction in the risk of dementia was observed with long-term use of antihypertensive drugs in combination with a diuretic, lipid-lowering drug or oral anticoagulant (OR 0.66–0.84).
