Link to study: American Academy of Neurology
After adjusting for factors such as age, sex and race, as well as health-related factors such as high blood pressure and diabetes, researchers found people who had been taking acid reflux drugs for more than 4.4 years had a 33% higher risk of developing dementia than people who never took the drugs.
“A buzzy new study on heartburn meds and dementia doesn’t actually clarify anything”
https://www.vox.com/health/2023/8/10/23827408/dementia-heartburn-proton-pump-inhibitors-ppi-prilosec
“Importantly, the study comes on the heels of several larger, higher-quality studies showing the exact opposite of its conclusions — namely, that these medications do not portend an increased risk of dementia.”
Thank you for that. I take anti heartburn meds due to acid reflux and glad to hear not going get dementia from it.
Sir, this is a Wendy’s.
“If acid reflux is not controlled well, it can cause a variety of complications, including cancer at a later stage,” said Desai. So people should not be ditching their heartburn medications en masse based on alarming headlines.
While that’s true, it’s also apparent that Doctors in the US massively overprescrbe medicines for conditions that are often better addressed through lifestyle changes. Acid reflux is one.
Unfortunately, acid reflux can’t always be resolved with lifestyle changes. But it probably can in most cases.
The Vox article does a better job of communicating the findings without the hyperbolic headline. The study wasn’t explicitly designed to look for association. Nonetheless, the data is there.
Neither study does a particularly good job determining causality. The higher quality study was limited in time (3 years) and participant age but perhaps the findings also broadly apply.
I hear “proton p–” and immediately start looking around for the Ghostbusters. Anyway, carry on.
ah ah ah ah ah ah, oh god… ah ah ah ah ah ah my cheeks hurt
The papers under discussion:
Cumulative Use of Proton Pump Inhibitors and Risk of Dementia: The Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study
https://n.neurology.org/content/early/2023/08/09/WNL.0000000000207747Association of Proton Pump Inhibitor Use With Incident Dementia and Cognitive Decline in Older Adults: A Prospective Cohort Study
https://www.gastrojournal.org/article/S0016-5085%2823%2900873-9/fulltextSafety of Proton Pump Inhibitors Based on a Large, Multi-Year, Randomized Trial of Patients Receiving Rivaroxaban or Aspirin
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31152740/Getting old is just so awful. If you don’t get dementia, then you might get cancer based on what someone else posted about what untreated acid reflux can do.
Not much of a choice. The way we approach end of life is not discussed enough. It feels like there has to be something better than a gradual slide into decrepitude or jumping off a bridge.
