New Test may Predict Dementia by Monitoring Your Sleep

Monitoring brainwaves overnight may help predict memory loss before it starts, according to a new study. The findings of the study are published in the journal JAMA Network Open.

The study used a model to assess the difference between a person's actual age and their brain's biological age during sleep.

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Dementia patients had much higher scores compared to non-dementia patients, showing signs of cognitive decline.

The research team from Massachusetts General Hospital says the findings shed fresh insights on the age-related brain disease and may offer hope of earlier diagnosis and treatments that could slow down symptoms progression.

The team created a model known as the Brain Age Index (BAI). BAI uses artificial intelligence sleep data to determine the difference between a person's current age and their brain's biological age by watching at electrical measurements during the sleep.

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With aging and neurodegenerative disease, sleep is more fragmented, and there is rapid eye movement sleep and less slow-wave sleep.

Researchers looked at more than 5000 sleep tests of over 3500 patients with either mild cognitive impairment, dementia, cognitive symptoms but no diagnosis of impairment, and without dementia. Results revealed that BAI values rose as cognitive decline increased.

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The study concludes that BAI has potential as a screening tool for the presence of underlying neurodegenerative disease and the monitoring of disease progression.

Source-Medindia

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