Study ties higher blood sugar to dementia risk [View all]

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP-Excite

By MARILYNN MARCHIONE

Higher blood-sugar levels, even those well short of diabetes, seem to raise the risk of developing dementia, a major new study finds. Researchers say it suggests a novel way to try to prevent Alzheimer's disease - by keeping glucose at a healthy level.

Alzheimer's is by far the most common form of dementia and it's long been known that diabetes makes it more likely. The new study tracked blood sugar over time in all sorts of people - with and without diabetes - to see how it affects risk for the mind-robbing disease.

The results challenge current thinking by showing that it's not just the high glucose levels of diabetes that are a concern, said the study's leader, Dr. Paul Crane of the University of Washington in Seattle.

"It's a nice, clean pattern" - risk rises as blood sugar does, said Dallas Anderson, a scientist at the National Institute on Aging, the federal agency that paid for the study.

FULL story at link.


Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20130807/DA81BO4O1.html

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This Jan. 3, 2009 file photo shows a person with diabetes testing his blood sugar level in Kamen, Germany. New research published in the Thursday, Aug. 8, 2013 New England Journal of Medicine suggests a possible way to help prevent Alzheimer's disease: Keeping blood sugar at a healthy level. A study found that higher glucose levels, even those well short of diabetes, seemed to raise the risk for dementia. (AP Photo/Joerg Sarbach, File)