Dr. Philip Frank

Also in the podcast... Losing confidence in yourself, difficulties coping with problems, impaired social connectedness, feeling nervous and difficulties concentrating.

What we already know is actually that depression in midlife is a potential risk factor for dementia later in life.

What we didn't know before our study is whether it's actually everyone with depression in midlife who is at an increased risk of dementia or whether it's only people with very specific symptoms or symptom profiles.

Now, in midlife, we assessed roughly 30 symptoms.

And of these 30 symptoms, we found six symptoms that were strongly linked to later dementia risk.

These include losing confidence in yourself, difficulties coping with problems, impaired social connectedness, also like feeling nervous and difficulties concentrating.

Our study can't really answer the question whether these symptoms are actually already early signs of dementia or independent risk factors signaling dementia risk.

However, what's important in our study is the timing, really, because we assessed these symptoms two decades before dementia was diagnosed.

And these symptoms are very important in their own rights.

They can mean many things.

So it's definitely something where we see a strong link.

We also looked at other dementia-related risk factors and controlled for them in our studies, and we still found that this link was still there.

What was also interesting is that symptoms which are actually very common in people with depression, such as low mood or sleep problems, these weren't related to later dementia risk.

Featured here on this British Pathy newsreel from 1949.