People who have high blood pressure face lower risk for Alzheimer’s disease, claims a new study.
Associate Professor, and co-author of the study John Kauwe at Brigham Young University, said that it was likely that the protective effect was coming from antihypertensive drugs.
The study analysed genetic data from 17,008 individuals with Alzheimer’s and 37,154 people without the disease. Data came from the Alzheimer’s Disease Genetics Consortium and the International Genomics of Alzheimer’s Project.
Fellow co-author and Associate Professor Paul Crane, at University of Washington of internal medicine said it may be that high blood pressure was protective, or it may be that something that people with high blood pressure are exposed to more often, such as antihypertensive medication, has been protecting them from Alzheimer’s disease.
University of Cambridge senior investigator scientist Robert Scott led the study, which used “Mendelian randomization” to find if the risk factors for the disease.
The study is published in PLOS Medicine.
