If you have ever had a relative with dementia, you know how heart-wrenching it is. Watching someone you love gradually fade away due to memory loss and confusion is so difficult. I experienced this with my dear grandmother, who throughout her life was a devoted pastor’s wife known for her kindness and generosity.  As she slipped into dementia, the only thing that momentarily brought her back was when my mom played her favorite church hymns on the piano. For those brief moments she sang with a radiant smile, reconnecting with us before slipping back into the shadows of her condition.

We are constantly searching for ways to prevent dementia and to better understand the underlying changes in the brain that lead to such debilitating memory loss and cognitive decline. A new study may offer valuable insights into this complex neurocognitive condition.

The study was published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, a journal that focuses on clinical aging research.  Australian researchers studied 2,132 people at an average age of 76 and followed them over 10 years. They looked at both chronic anxiety and new onset anxiety and the role it may play in development of dementia. What they found was that both chronic and new anxiety were associated with a 2 to 3 times greater risk for dementia. When anxiety was present before the age of 70, the risk was even higher.

Now, this is not a causal study, meaning they aren’t saying anxiety directly causes dementia. However, the study found a potential risk factor for promoting dementia.

Here is the good news. We can target anxiety as a possible prevention for dementia. In the study, people who resolved their anxiety did not have this increased risk of dementia. Thus, anxiety should be treated to avoid risk, another good reason to pay attention to your mental health.

Living with anxiety is not good for your physical body, the mind or the spirit. The Bible has good reason to tell us to be anxious about nothing. And this may be one of those reasons.