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A person's cholesterol levels may provide insight into their risk for developing dementia, according to research from UT Health San Antonio.
Glenn Biggs Institute for Alzheimer’s and Neurodegenerative Diseases researcher Dr. Sokratis Charisis analyzed data from the Framingham Heart Study and confirmed that participants with high HDL, or "bad" cholesterol, were at high risk for developing heart disease, but found they were also much more likely to develop dementia.
Charisis said the link between high HDL and dementia wasn't surprising.
"It's another piece of evidence that reinforces our view that cardiovascular health is really important in terms of brain health," he said.
However, Charisis's analysis of the relationship between LDL — "good" cholesterol — and dementia yielded an unexpected result. If good cholesterol was low, patients were less likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease. Those with the lowest levels had the lowest risk of developing the disease.
Low good cholesterol is generally discouraged by heart doctors. High LDL is protective against heart disease; low LDL is not. "It goes to show that this relationship between blood lipids and cholesterol might not be as straightforward as we think," Charisis said. "There might be different pathways linking them to Alzheimer's disease than those linking them to cardiovascular health."
A third blood lipid — one that isn't typically tested in an annual checkup — also has a clear correlation to dementia risk. ApoB48 is involved in moving dietary fats from the gut to other body tissues through the bloodstream. High levels of this lipoprotein were associated with a much lower risk of developing Alzheimer's. Charisis found that intriguing, he said, "because it uncovers the complex biological relationship that might be behind these associations."
Charisis concluded that keeping your HDL low is a good idea for both heart and brain health, but advice regarding LDL may be more nuanced.
“It might be important to have dynamic goals and targets based on people's ages, for example," Charisis explained.
Further study of these relationships could ultimately lead to ways to use individual blood lipid profiles to better predict and perhaps prevent Alzheimer’s, Charisis said, which he called "the epidemic of our time."
Worldwide, 57.4 million people were living with dementia in 2019, a number that is expected to surge past 152 million by 2050.
This study was published on May 30 in the journal Neurology.
