Cognitive Training May Help Prevent Dementia

Specialist in the field of aging claim to have found a form of exercise for the brain that may help reduce the risk of dementia. This cognitive training showed benefits of up to ten years after the participants engaged in the program. According to Frederick W. Unverzagt, PhD, from the Indiana University School of Medicine. Findings have been published in the Alzheimer & Dementia Translational Research and Clinical Interventions.

The proportion of participants in the program to develop dementia later on was significantly smaller when compared to those of which did not. The positive benefits were observed and measurable even though the amount of training was relatively small and spread out over 10 one hour long sessions over a period of six weeks and 8 booster sessions after that.

The study involved 2,892 healthy adults in the age grouping of 65 and older, from multiple locations who were assigned to 1 of 4 treatment groups at random. Participants who practiced with strategies to help improve memory of life events and activities. Participants who practiced with strategies to help improve problem solving and related issues. Participants who practiced with strategies that were computer based speed processing exercises. And a control group of which none of the participants received any cognitive training.

The speed processing training involved using adaptive training software with touch screens, participants identified objects in the middle of the screen while identifying the location of briefly of the objects they saw in the periphery. The software would adjust the difficulty and speed of the exercises based on how the participants performed. In contrast of the reasoning and memory programs used in more traditional practice and instruction methods that might occur in a classroom setting.

Cognitive training consisted of ten sessions which were about an hour long in duration, over a 5 to 6 week period. 80% of the participants who completed the first round of training were eligible to receive a booster sessions which consisted of four sessions 60 to 75 minutes long at 11 and 35 months following the initial cognitive training session. Researchers assessed the participants immediately after the training, then followed up with assessments again at the 1, 2, 3, 5, and 10 year marks after training.

1,220 participants were able to complete the 10 year follow up reassessments, due to death and other factors. During that time frame it was found that 260 of the participants had developed dementia. The risk of developing dementia was up to 29% lower for the individuals who had participated on the speed processing training than of those which that were in the control group, the benefits of those who received booster training were even stronger. It was noted that the  reasoning and memory training had showed benefits for reducing the risk of dementia, but not statistically significant.

Previous studies have shown that active cognitive training had improved the participants abilities with the ease of activities of day to day living at the 5 and 10 year marks after the training. The findings of the role of active cognitive training on incidence of dementia wasn’t significant after the 5 year follow up.