Official records do not capture dementia’s outsized impact on mortality rates in the United States, according to an analysis of data from a nationally representative sample of nursing home residents.
The total number of deaths actually caused by dementia are 13.6%, — about 2.7 times more than reported in U.S. death certificates, reported Andrew Stokes, Ph.D. from the Boston University School of Public Health. What’s more, the underreporting varies greatly by race, he and his colleagues have found. About seven times more Black older adults, four times more Hispanic older adults, and two times more white older adults die from dementia than government records indicate, the researchers said.
Dementia deaths among men compared with women, and for elders without a high school education, also were higher than officially counted.
“In the case of dementia, there are numerous challenges to obtaining accurate death counts, including stigma and lack of routine testing for dementia in primary care,” Stokes said in a statement. “Our results indicate that the mortality burden of dementia may be greater than recognized, highlighting the importance of expanding dementia prevention and care.”
The researchers used data from more than 7,300 participants in the Health and Retirement Study, which gathers data from individuals starting when they move into a nursing home.
Full findings were published in JAMA Neurology.
