People who have suffered from depression at some point in their lives have a higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease than those who haven’t experienced it, according to a new study.
Research led by Dr Monique Breteler with the Erasmus University Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, found that people between the age of 60 and 90 who had experienced depression were 2.5 times more likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease than those who hadn’t.
The study discovered that the risk of developing the age-related neurological disease was almost four times higher for people who encountered depression before the age of 60, than those with no history of the illness.
Commenting on the findings, Dr Breteler explained: "We don’t know yet whether depression contributes to the development of Alzheimer’s disease or whether another unknown factor causes both depression and dementia."
Calling for further research to be done on the subject, she said: "We’ll need to do more studies to understand the relationship between depression and dementia."
