By Robert Preidt, Healthday News
Published Week of July 29 - August 4 

Social networks -- such as having close friends and staying in contact with family members -- help protect against the damaging effects of Alzheimer's disease, a new U.S. study finds.

"Many elderly people who have the tangles and plaques associated with Alzheimer's disease don't clinically experience cognitive impairment or dementia," Dr. David A. Bennett of the Rush University Medical Center's Alzheimer's Disease Center, Chicago, said in a prepared statement. "Our findings suggest that social networks are related to something that offers a 'protective reserve' capacity that spares them the clinical manifestations of Alzheimer's disease," he said.

The study included 89 elderly people without known dementia taking part in the Rush Memory and Aging Project. While they were alive, each provided information about their social networks and underwent 21 cognitive performance tests each year. After they died, their brains were analyzed.

The larger a person's social network, the less effect the tangles and plaques had on their cognitive test scores. This protective effect was noted across different kinds of cognitive abilities but was most evident for semantic memory, which contains knowledge about the world and is involved in language and other uniquely human cognitive processes.

The study currently appears online in The Lancet Neurology as well as in the print issue of the journal.

"Identifying factors associated with the ability to tolerate the pathology of Alzheimer's has important implications for disease prevention," Bennett said. "Previous studies suggest one factor is education. Now we know that healthy and frequent interactions with friends and family have a positive impact as well," he added.

More information

SOURCE: Rush University, news release
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