Lithium may reduce risk of developing dementia: Study

Cambridge: A new research led by the University of Cambridge has identified a link that suggests lithium may reduce the risk of developing dementia. The research was published in the journal PLOS Medicine. The research retrospectively analyzed the health records of nearly 30,000 patients from the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust.

The patients were over 50 years of age and used NHS mental health services between 2005 and 2019. The analysis suggested that patients who received lithium were less likely to develop dementia than those who did not, although the total number of patients receiving lithium was smaller. It also suggested that lithium may be a preventive treatment for dementia and may be pursued for larger randomized controlled trials.

Dementia is the leading cause of death in the elderly Western population, but no preventive treatment is currently available. More than 55 million people worldwide have dementia, with Alzheimer’s disease being the most common form.

“The number of people living with dementia continues to grow, which puts enormous pressure on health care systems,” said Dr Shanquan Chen, from the Cambridge Department of Psychiatry.

“It is estimated that delaying the onset of dementia by just five years can reduce its prevalence and economic impact by up to 40 percent.”

Previous studies have proposed lithium as a potential treatment for people who have already been diagnosed with dementia or early cognitive impairment, but it is not clear whether it can completely prevent the development of dementia. or may stop, as these studies are limited in size.

Lithium is a mood stabilizer commonly prescribed for conditions such as bipolar affective disorder and depression.

“Bipolar disorder and depression are thought to put people at increased risk of dementia, so we had to make sure to take this into account in our analysis,” Chen said.

Chen and colleagues analyzed data from patients accessing mental health services from the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust between 2005 and 2019.

Patients were over 50 years of age, received at least a one-year follow-up appointment, and had not previously been diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment or dementia.

Of the 29,618 patients in the study cohort, 548 patients were treated with lithium and 29,070 were not. Their average age was less than 74 years, and about 40 percent of patients were male. For the group receiving lithium, 53, or 9.7 percent, were diagnosed with dementia.

For the group that did not receive lithium, 3,244, or 11.2 percent, were diagnosed with dementia.

After controlling for factors such as smoking, other medications, and other physical and mental illnesses, lithium use was associated with a lower risk of dementia for both short-term and long-term users.

However, since the overall number of patients receiving lithium was small and this was an observational study, larger clinical trials would be needed to establish lithium as a potential treatment for dementia.

Another limitation of the study was the number of patients who were diagnosed with bipolar disorder, which is commonly associated with an increased risk of dementia.

“We expected to find that patients with bipolar disorder were more likely to develop dementia because it is the most common reason for prescribing lithium, but our analysis suggested the opposite,” Chen said.

“It is too early to say for sure, but it is possible that lithium may reduce the risk of dementia in people with bipolar disorder,” he concluded.

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