WHO recommends a healthy lifestyle to reduce the risk of dementia

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The World Health Organization (WHO) today published new guidelines to reduce the risk of dementia, recommend a healthy lifestyle that includes regular exercise, not smoking, avoiding the harmful use of alcohol and controlling weight. The new guidelines provide the knowledge base for health care providers to advise patients on what they can do to help prevent cognitive decline and dementia. Specific recommendations to reduce the risk of dementia include regular physical activity, not smoking, a healthy and balanced diet, avoiding dangerous and harmful alcohol consumption, cognitive training for older adults, and social participation and social support. The WHO also advocates for the proper management of a variety of health indicators as the ages grow, such as overweight and obesity in middle age, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, dyslipidemia, depression and hearing loss. . The guidelines will be useful for governments, policy makers and planning authorities to guide them in developing policies and designing programs that promote healthy lifestyles, said the WHO. WHO strongly recommends that countries manage the growing health problem of dementia through the creation of national policies and plans, the essential element of which is support for carers of people with dementia. Dementia is a disease characterized by a deterioration in cognitive function beyond what might be expected from normal aging. It affects memory, thinking, orientation, comprehension, calculation, learning ability, language and judgment. Dementia is the result of a variety of diseases and injuries that affect the brain, such as Alzheimer's disease or a stroke.

WHO statistics show that dementia is a rapidly growing global public health problem. Around the world, around 50 million people have dementia, and almost 60 percent live in low and middle income countries. The total number of people with dementia is projected to reach 82 million in 2030 and 152 million in 2050. While age is the strongest known risk factor for cognitive decline, dementia is not a natural or inevitable consequence of aging, the WHO said. Studies have shown a relationship between the development of dementia with risk factors related to lifestyle, certain medical conditions and other risk factors such as social isolation and cognitive inactivity.