A large, long-term study reveals that dealing with stress during middle age may trigger lasting physiological brain changes, increasing the risk of developing dementia later in life.
This finding comes from the Prospective Population Study of Women in Gothenburg, Sweden, which started in 1968 and followed over 800 Swedish women for around 40 years. Results of the study were published online in the journal BMJ Open.
Researchers from the study looked at previous studies showing how stress can cause both structural and functional brain damage, as well as promote inflammation.
They say stress hormones can remain at high levels, long after a traumatic event has passed.
Previous studies looked at the effect of severe psychological stressors in adulthood, such as combat, natural disasters and the Holocaust, and they revealed that mental and physical health were affected decades later.
However, the researchers say that although mild psychosocial stressors are a regular part of life, the "long-term consequences of these more common stressors" have remained unclear.
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