ADHD linked to four-fold greater risk of cognitive impairment

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By Olivia Bowthorpe

Adults with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder may have a significantly increased risk of developing mild cognitive impairment or dementia in later life, research suggests.

Once other risk factors were taken into account, ADHD was linked with a more than four-fold higher rate of cognitive impairment, a large US study found.

Researchers included almost 190,000 people aged 50 and over who were followed for an average of ten years.

Among just over 3,000 participants with an ADHD diagnosis, 6.7% developed mild cognitive impairment or dementia during follow-up, compared with 3.4% of those without ADHD.

This link was lower when adjusted for neuropsychiatric comorbidities, but remained substantial, over three-fold.

'Markedly increased risk'

The researchers, led by Dr Tharick Pascoal, associate professor of psychiatry and neurology at the University of Pittsburgh, also looked at genetic susceptibility to ADHD using a polygenic risk score, combining the effects of multiple genetic variants linked to ADHD.