Journal Club - Higher antioxidant levels linked to lower dementia risk?

Dementia is commonly used to describe a group of symptoms affecting memory, thinking and social abilities severely enough to interfere with your daily life. It isnt a specific disease, but several diseases can cause dementia. Though dementia generally involves memory loss, memory loss does have different causes as well.

According to a study published in the online issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology, it was observed that people with higher levels of antioxidants in their blood may be less likely to develop dementia.

The study involved 7,283 people who were at least 45 years old at the beginning of the study. They had a physical exam, interview and blood tests for antioxidant levels at the beginning of the study. They were then followed for an average of 16 years to see who developed dementia. The study found that people with the highest levels of the antioxidants lutein and zeaxanthin and beta- cryptoxanthin in their blood were less likely to develop dementia decades later than people with lower levels of the antioxidants.

Lutein and zeaxanthin are found in green, leafy vegetables such as kale, spinach, broccoli and peas. Beta-cryptoxanthin is found in fruits such as oranges, papaya, tangerines. It's important to note that the effect of these antioxidants on the risk of dementia was reduced when other factors such as education, income and physical activity were taken into account. Hence, the authros concluded that it's possible that those factors may help explain the relationship between antioxidant levels and dementia.