Sex/gender differences in lifetime dementia risk among Asian American and White older adults

TL;DR

The study found that women across various racial groups have a higher lifetime risk of dementia compared to men.

Contribution

The paper provides new insights into sex/gender differences in dementia risk among Asian American and White older adults.

Findings

Lifetime dementia risk was consistently higher among women across all racial groups.

The largest difference was observed in South Asian women, with a 21 percentage point higher risk compared to men.

Abstract

Evidence on differences in dementia risk by sex and gender is mixed. We aimed to compare lifetime dementia risk by sex/gender among Asian American and non-Latino White adults aged 60 and older. We included Chinese (n = 6415), Filipino (n = 5020), Japanese (n = 3314), South Asian (n = 1061), and non-Latino White (n = 143,667) Kaiser Permanente Northern California members aged ≥60 years who completed health surveys (2002–2020) and were dementia-free at baseline. We estimated cause-specific cumulative dementia incidence from age 60 to 95 years (i.e., lifetime dementia risk, treating death as a competing event) and evaluated sex/gender differences. Lifetime dementia risk was higher among women in all groups, ranging from 7 (95% CI: 2–13) percentage points higher for Japanese women vs. men to 21 (8–38) percentage points higher for South Asian women vs. men. Variations of sex/gender differences across racial and ethnic groups are potentially driven by dementia-free mortality and social and structural factors.

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