A new study led by researchers at UC San Francisco and Kaiser Permanente Washington found that personalised health and lifestyle changes can delay or even prevent memory loss for higher-risk older adults. Findings were published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine. The study, known as SMARRT, for systematic multi-domain Alzheimer's risk reduction trial, was a randomised clinical trial with a 2-year personalised, risk-reduction intervention. A total of 172 participants at elevated risk for dementia (age 70-89 years and with ≥2 of 8 targeted risk factors) were recruited from primary care clinics associated with Kaiser Permanente Washington.
Data were collected from August 2018 to August 2022 and analysed from October 2022 to September 2023. 82 participants were randomly assigned to the intervention group (personalised risk-reduction goals with health coaching and nurse visits) and 90 participants to the control group who were mailed education materials every three months. This study differed to others in providing personal coaching that was customised to each participant. After two years, results showed that the personalised and multidomain intervention demonstrated larger improvements in the composite cognitive score, better composite risk factor score and improved quality of life compared with a health education control group.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/article-abstract/2811803
