Staying Social May Keep Dementia at Bay

FRIDAY, June 27 (HealthDay News) -- The key to a healthy mind in old age may lie in an active social life, a new study suggests.

"If you are socially engaged, you are at lower risk of dementia," said Dr. Valerie C. Crooks, a researcher at the Department of Research and Evaluation, Kaiser Permanente Southern California.

During her study, which followed more than 2,200 women ages 78 and older for four years, those with large social networks reduced their risk of getting dementia by 26 percent, she said.

Previous studies about the association between social engagement with family and friends and cognitive functioning in old age have yielded mixed results, Crooks noted. For example, "there were studies that said being married is helpful, and studies that said being married is not so helpful," she said.

In recent studies, social contact has been generally found to be protective of cognitive functioning, however, she said.

For this new study, published in the July issue of theAmerican Journal of Public Health, Crooks and her colleagues conducted telephone interviews with the women, all of who were members of the Kaiser Permanente HMO. The women were free of dementia when the study started in 2001.

The team tested each woman's cognitive status by phone and reviewed her medical records to help assess it, as well. They also asked about social interactions with a spouse and/or other family and friends, including how many people they interacted with and how often.

Crooks' team also asked the women how many people they felt they could rely on if they needed help and whether they had a person or persons they could talk to about personal issues.

At the end of the follow-up, 268 of the women had been diagnosed with dementia.

Those with larger social networks also showed a reduced risk for dementia, whose most common form is Alzheimer's disease.

"In this study, we found marriage didn't make a difference in terms of dementia risk," she said. In other words, it was the social network that was protective, regardless of whether the woman was married or not.

"Those with daily contact or more had a lower risk of dementia," she said. The contact didn't have to be face-to-face -- e-mail and telephone interaction counted, Crooks added.