The researchers said in the study, which was detailed by the British newspaper “The Guardian”, that their findings underscore the importance of adopting healthy patterns early in life.
More than 57 million people suffer from dementia globally, and the number is expected to increase to 153 million by 2050.
Numerous evidence shows that the development of many diseases is common in people with dementia, but studies examining the relationship between chronic diseases at an early age and the risk of developing dementia are not yet available.
In an attempt to answer this question, researchers at the Universities of London and Paris set out to conduct a study examining the long-term association between multiple diseases at ages 55, 60, 65 and 70 and dementia, which affects humans at a later stage.
This study is based on data collected from 10,000 Britons, and looked at the association of social, behavioral and biological factors with long-term health.
The participants in the study were between 35 and 55 years old, and they were not suffering from dementia when they joined the study between 1985 and 1988.
In the study, researchers defined multiple diseases as having at least two chronic problems from a specific list of 13 types, including heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, heart failure, depression, liver disease, stroke, arthritis and cancer.
The study, published in the British Medical Journal, found that the risk of developing dementia was greater when these types of conditions developed at a younger age (the mid-fifties), rather than later in life.
The younger a person was 5 years old and diagnosed with multiple diseases, the higher the risk of developing dementia by 18 percent.
The study found 639 cases of dementia over a 32-year follow-up period.
“Given the lack of effective treatment for dementia and its personal and societal implications, finding dementia prevention targets is imperative,” the researchers wrote.
“These findings highlight the role of chronic disease prevention and containment throughout adulthood to mitigate negative outcomes in aging,” he added.
Professor Paul Morgan of Cardiff University’s Dementia Research Institute described the study as “historic”.
Morgan, who was not involved in the study, said it found that the number of chronic health conditions and how long a person had them were strong predictors of dementia.