Older adults with high vitamin D levels may be less likely to develop dementia, according to a six-year, multiethnic study.
Investigators followed more than 1,700 study participants aged 65 or more years without dementia. Participants were assessed using follow‐up visits and food frequency questionnaires. About 320 were subsequently diagnosed with dementia.
Participants with the highest levels of vitamin D intake from food had a lower risk of dementia over time when compared with participants who consumed the least vitamin D from food, reported Yian Gu, M.D., Ph.D., a neurodegenerative disease researcher from Columbia University.
The results held after Gu and colleagues adjusted for a variety of dementia risk factors. These included age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, genetic markers of late-onset Alzheimer’s, physical activity, Mediterranean diet score, income, depression, hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and smoking.
The study was published in the journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia.
