Physical Activity and Incident Cognitive Impairment in Elderly Persons

Background: Data regarding the relationship between physicalactivityandcognitiveimpairmentarelimitedand controversial. We examined whether physical activity is associated with incident cognitive impairment during follow-up. Methods:Aspartofacommunity-basedprospectivecohort study in southern Bavaria, Germany, 3903 participants older than 55 years were enrolled between 2001 and 2003 and followed up for 2 years. Physical activity (classified as no activity, moderate activity [3 times/ wk], and high activity [3 times/wk]), cognitive function(assessedbythe6-ItemCognitiveImpairmentTest), andpotentialconfounderswereevaluated.Themainoutcome measure was incident cognitive impairment after 2 years of follow-up. Results:At baseline, 418 participants (10.7%) had cognitive impairment. After a 2-year follow-up, 207 of 3485 initially unimpaired subjects (5.9%) developed incident cognitiveimpairment.Comparedwithparticipantswithout physical activity, fully adjusted multiple logistic regression analysis showed a significantly reduced risk of incident cognitive impairment after 2 years for participants with moderate or high physical activity at baseline(oddsratio[OR],0.57;95%confidenceinterval[CI], 0.37-0.87 [P=.01]; and OR, 0.54; 95% CI, 0.35-0.83 [P=.005]; respectively). Further subanalysis including participants(n=2029)withoutfunctionalimpairmentand withoutprodromalphaseofdementiaresultedinaneven higher reduction of risk of incident cognitive impairment for participants with moderate or high physical activity(OR,0.44;95%CI,0.24-0.83[P=.01];andOR,0.46; 95%CI,0.25-0.85[P=.01];respectively)comparedwith no activity. Conclusion: Moderate or high physical activity is associated with a reduced incidence of cognitive impairment after 2 years in a large population-based cohort of elderly subjects.

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