Publications by authors named "Jan-Willem van Dalen"

Background: Current prediction models for mainland Europe do not include ethnicity, despite ethnic disparities in cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk. SCORE2 performance was evaluated across the largest ethnic groups in the Netherlands and ethnic backgrounds were added to the model.

Methods: 11,614 participants, aged between 40 and 70 years without CVD, from the population-based multi-ethnic HELIUS study were included.

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Objective: Midlife dyslipidemia is associated with higher risk of dementia in late-life dementia, but the impact of late-life dyslipidemia on dementia risk is uncertain. This may be due to the large heterogeneity in cholesterol measures and study designs employed. We used detailed data from a large prospective cohort of older persons to comprehensively assess the relation between a broad range of cholesterol measures and incident dementia, addressing potential biases, confounders, and modifiers.

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Background: Hypertension is a modifiable risk factor for dementia affecting over 70% of individuals older than 60. Lowering dementia risk through preferential treatment with antihypertensive medication (AHM) classes that are otherwise equivalent in indication could offer a cost-effective, safe, and accessible approach to reducing dementia incidence globally. Certain AHM-classes have been associated with lower dementia risk, potentially attributable to angiotensin-II-receptor (Ang-II) stimulating properties.

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There is evidence that blood pressure variability (BPV) is associated with cerebral small vessel disease (SVD) and may therefore increase the risk of stroke and dementia. It remains unclear if BPV is associated with SVD progression over years. We examined whether visit-to-visit BPV is associated with white matter hyperintensity (WMH) progression over 14 years and MRI markers after 14 years.

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Importance: High visit-to-visit blood pressure variability (BPV) in late life may reflect increased dementia risk better than mean systolic blood pressure (SBP). Evidence from midlife to late life could be crucial to understanding this association.

Objective: To determine whether visit-to-visit BPV at different ages was differentially associated with lifetime incident dementia risk in community-dwelling individuals.

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Observational studies have shown consistently that modifiable risk factors during life are associated with increased dementia risk in old age but randomized controlled trials (RCTs) on dementia prevention evaluating the treatment of these risk factors did not find consistent effects on cognitive outcomes. The discrepancy in findings is potentially attributable to inherent differences between the two study designs. Although RCTs are the gold standard for establishing causality, designing and conducting an RCT for dementia prevention is complex.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study examines the long-term effects of angiotensin II-stimulating antihypertensive medications, like ARBs and dihydropyridine CCBs, on dementia risk among older adults.
  • After 7 years, these medications were associated with a significantly lower risk of developing dementia, but the protective effects weakened after 10.4 years.
  • Ultimately, while the medications appeared to reduce dementia risk over time, the associations diminished, suggesting that their benefits may decrease as individuals age.
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Article Synopsis
  • - The study investigates whether a new MRI technique called 'spatial coefficient of variation' (ASL-sCoV) is a better indicator of cerebral atherosclerosis risk than conventional measures like white matter hyperintensity (WMH) volume and cerebral blood flow (ASL-CBF) in older adults with hypertension.
  • - In a trial with 195 participants aged 72-80 years, it was found that while ASL-CBF was associated with atherosclerotic risk only at baseline, ASL-sCoV showed significant correlations at both baseline and follow-up.
  • - Since WMH volume showed no association with atherosclerotic risk, the results suggest that ASL-sCoV could be a more reliable
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Background And Objectives: Low values of blood pressure, body mass index (BMI), and non-high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol have all been associated with increased dementia risk in late life, but whether these risk factors have an additive effect is unknown. This study assessed whether a combination of late-life low values for systolic blood pressure (SBP), BMI, and non-HDL cholesterol is associated with a higher dementia risk than individual low values of these risk factors.

Methods: This is a post hoc analysis based on an observational extended follow-up of the Prevention of Dementia by Intensive Vascular Care (preDIVA) trial, including community-dwelling individuals, aged 70-78 years and free from dementia at baseline.

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Hypertension is an important risk factor for Alzheimer's disease (AD) and all-cause dementia. The mechanisms underlying this association are unclear. Hypertension may be associated with AD neuropathological changes (ADNC), but reports are sparse and inconsistent.

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Purpose: Cognitive diagnostic work-up in primary care is not always physically feasible, owing to chronic disabilities and/or travel restrictions. The identification of dementia might be facilitated with diagnostic instruments that are time efficient and easy to perform, as well as useful in the remote setting. We assessed whether the Telephone Interview for Cognitive Status (TICS) might be a simple and accurate alternative for remote diagnostic cognitive screening in primary care.

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Importance: The optimal systolic blood pressure (SBP) to minimize the risk of dementia in older age is unknown.

Objective: To investigate whether the association between SBP and dementia risk is U-shaped and whether age and comorbidity play a role in this association.

Design, Setting, And Participants: This cohort study used an individual participant data approach to analyze 7 prospective, observational, population-based cohort studies that were designed to evaluate incident dementia in older adults.

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Background: Older people with subjective memory complaints (SMC) and Instrumental Activities of Daily Living impairments (IADL-I) have an increased risk of developing dementia. Previous reports suggest that the predictive value of SMC and IADL-I may differ between sexes, leaving possible consequences for personalized risk prediction and prognosis. However, none of these studies addressed the competing risk of death, which may substantially differ between sexes.

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Introduction: The postural instability gait difficulty motor subtype of patients with Parkinson's disease (PIGD-PD) has been associated with more severe cognitive pathology and a higher risk on dementia compared to the tremor-dominant subtype (TD-PD). Here, we investigated whether the microstructural integrity of the cholinergic projections from the nucleus basalis of Meynert (NBM) was different between these clinical subtypes.

Methods: Diffusion-weighted imaging data of 98 newly-diagnosed unmedicated PD patients (44 TD-PD and 54 PIGD-PD subjects) and 10 healthy controls, were analysed using diffusion tensor imaging, focusing on the white matter tracts associated with cholinergic projections from the NBM (NBM-WM) as the tract-of-interest.

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Background: In patients with atrial fibrillation who survive an anticoagulation-associated intracerebral haemorrhage, a decision must be made as to whether restarting or permanently avoiding anticoagulation is the best long-term strategy to prevent recurrent stroke and other vascular events. In APACHE-AF, we aimed to estimate the rates of non-fatal stroke or vascular death in such patients when treated with apixaban compared with when anticoagulation was avoided, to inform the design of a larger trial.

Methods: APACHE-AF was a prospective, randomised, open-label, phase 2 trial with masked endpoint assessment, done at 16 hospitals in the Netherlands.

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Objectives: To systematically review and synthesize the evidence on differential associations between antihypertensive medication (AHM) classes and the risk of incident dementia.

Design: Systematic review and random effects frequentist network meta-analysis. Embase, MEDLINE, and the Cochrane library were searched from origin to December 2019.

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Consistent cerebral blood flow (CBF) is fundamental to brain function. Cerebral autoregulation ensures CBF stability. Chronic hypertension can lead to disrupted cerebral autoregulation in older people, potentially leading to blood pressure levels interfering with CBF.

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Objective: To assess whether angiotensin II-stimulating antihypertensives (thiazides, dihydropyridine calcium channel blockers, and angiotensin I receptor blockers) convey a lower risk of incident dementia compared to angiotensin II-inhibiting antihypertensives (angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors, β-blockers, and nondihydropyridine calcium channel blockers), in accordance with the "angiotensin hypothesis."

Methods: We performed Cox regression analyses of incident dementia (or mortality as competing risk) during 6-8 years of follow-up in a population sample of 1,909 community-dwelling individuals (54% women) without dementia, aged 70-78 (mean 74.5 ± 2.

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Introduction: Although not designed as such, dementia risk scores might be useful surrogate outcomes for dementia prevention trials. Their suitability may be improved by using continuous scoring systems, taking into account all changes in risk factors, not only those crossing cut-off values.

Methods: In three large multidomain dementia prevention trials with 1.

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An unhealthy lifestyle increases the risk of dementia. Two observational studies explored whether targeted health and lifestyle interventions could attenuate or even offset increased genetic risk. Results from these observational studies are inconclusive.

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Objectives: Visit-to-visit blood pressure (BP) variability is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease and cognitive decline. Our aim was to assess the association between visit-to-visit BP variability and progression of white matter hyperintensities (WMH).

Design: Post-hoc analysis in the magnetic resonance imaging substudy of the randomized controlled trial prevention of dementia by intensive vascular care.

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Objectives: To evaluate whether discontinuation of antihypertensive medication in community-dwelling older people is associated with a reduction in memory complaints and/or incident dementia.

Design: Prospective observational cohort study within the Prevention of Dementia by Intensive Vascular Care (preDIVA) trial.

Setting And Participants: Community-dwelling participants (aged 70-78 years at baseline) who underwent 2-yearly assessments during 6-8 years of follow-up.

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