Why is dementia more common in women

Breast cancer remains the leading cause of death for UK women aged 35 to In countries including England and Australia, dementia is the leading cause of death for women Credit: Getty Images. And in England and Wales as well as in Australia , dementia has become the leading cause of death for women, knocking heart disease off the top spot.

Women typically live longer than men, so more have dementia. The older you are, the more likely to develop dementia Credit: Getty Images. Experts say this may be because of public health campaigns targeting heart disease and smoking. But because men tend to get heart disease younger and smoke more than women, these campaigns also may have helped stave off these risk factors more for men than women. Meanwhile, other risk factors for the disease affect women more than men.

Other risk factors affect only women, such as surgical menopause and pregnancy complications like pre-eclampsia , both of which have been linked to cognitive decline in later life. But over the past 15 years, she has seen the field change. It turns out, hormones can be effective in many cases for women. But it also became apparent that the timing of therapy was more important than anything. Maki has seen a few major findings emerge over the past 15 years.

But when hormones are added as women transition into menopause, the therapies can be effective in lessening their likelihood to develop the disease. Maki cautions that researchers still have a long way to go.

The authors found that there is a lack of research into biomarkers, social and work-related stressors, and response to treatments especially in regard to women.

But Maki says bodily stressors — whether hormonal, social or physical, can take serious tolls on at-risk populations as they cross into midlife. Search for a statistic Search. Related pages Prevalence by age in the UK Impact on carers. More information About Contact us Sitemap. This website uses cookies We use cookies to give you the best possible experience on our websites.

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