So is your therapy protocol going to include language training to offset your
33% chance of developing Dementia/Alzheimers after a stroke.?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24198291
Source
From
the Department of Neurology (S.A., M.S., A.K.S., S.K.), Nizam's
Institute of Medical Sciences, Hyderabad, India; Department of
Psychology (T.H.B.), Centre for Cognitive Aging and Cognitive
Epidemiology and Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences, University of
Edinburgh, UK; Department of Linguistics (V.D.), Osmania University,
Hyderabad; Centre for Neural and Cognitive Sciences (B.S.), University
of Hyderabad; and Department of Neurology (J.R.C.), Yashoda Hospitals,
Hyderabad, India.
Abstract
OBJECTIVES:
The
purpose of the study was to determine the association between
bilingualism and age at onset of dementia and its subtypes, taking into
account potential confounding factors.
METHODS:
Case
records of 648 patients with dementia (391 of them bilingual) diagnosed
in a specialist clinic were reviewed. The age at onset of first symptoms
was compared between monolingual and bilingual groups. The influence of
number of languages spoken, education, occupation, and other
potentially interacting variables was examined.
RESULTS:
Overall,
bilingual patients developed dementia 4.5 years later than the
monolingual ones. A significant difference in age at onset was found
across Alzheimer disease dementia as well as frontotemporal dementia and
vascular dementia, and was also observed in illiterate patients. There
was no additional benefit to speaking more than 2 languages. The
bilingual effect on age at dementia onset was shown independently of
other potential confounding factors such as education, sex, occupation,
and urban vs rural dwelling of subjects.
CONCLUSIONS:
This
is the largest study so far documenting a delayed onset of dementia in
bilingual patients and the first one to show it separately in different
dementia subtypes. It is the first study reporting a bilingual advantage
in those who are illiterate, suggesting that education is not a
sufficient explanation for the observed difference. The findings are
interpreted in the context of the bilingual advantages in attention and
executive functions.
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