There may be a correlation between obesity-related neurodegeneration and Alzheimer’s disease, according to experts at McGill University.
In the study released in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, the researchers sampled over 1,300 people and compared the patterns of gray matter atrophy between two conditions: obesity and Alzheimer’s.
The patients with Alzheimer’s were compared with healthy counterparts and obese patients were compared with non-obese patients.
“Similarly, we compared obesity brain maps with amyloid-β and tau protein maps from other studies,” the authors explained in the study.
“Obesity maps were highly correlated with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) maps but were not correlated with amyloid-β/tau protein maps. This effect was not accounted for by the presence of obesity in the AD group,” the authors found.
“Our research confirms that obesity-related grey matter atrophy resembles that of AD. Excess weight management could lead to improved health outcomes, slow down cognitive decline in aging, and lower the risk for AD.”
