【慢速VOA】2008-04-15
Study Links Midlife Belly Fat to Higher Risk of Dementia (1/2)
Being overweight can lead to high blood pressure, diabetes and heart attacks. But now there may be another reason to lose the fat, especially around the middle of the body. A recent study suggested that people in their forties with belly fat have an increased risk of dementia later in life.
Dementia is the name for a group of brain disorders that affect memory, behavior, learning and language. Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause. Dementia rarely appears before the age of sixty. The new study added to growing evidence that people with large stomachs can face greater health risks than others who are overweight.
The study involved more than six thousand northern California members of Kaiser Permanente, a health care organization. Researchers looked at the patients' medical records from between nineteen sixty-four and nineteen seventy-three. The people were in their early to mid-forties at the time. They were all part of a long-term health study that included measurements of belly fat.
The researchers compared the records with those from when the patients were in their seventies. By that time, almost one out of six of them had dementia. The researchers found that dementia was more common in those with wider bellies.
