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Is it possible to treat vascular dementia?

Dina Zekry

    Frontiers of Neurology and Neuroscience
    |February 3, 2009
    PubMed

    Insights

    Preventing vascular dementia through risk factor reduction, particularly hypertension, shows promise. Current curative treatments for vascular dementia remain ineffective, highlighting the need for better clinical trials.

    Area of Science:

    • Neurology
    • Gerontology
    • Public Health

    Background:

    • Vascular dementia is a significant cause of cognitive decline.
    • Primary and secondary prevention strategies show disease-modifying effects.
    • Current curative treatments have limited efficacy.

    Purpose of the Study:

    • To evaluate the effectiveness of prevention strategies for vascular dementia.
    • To assess the efficacy of current pharmacological treatments.
    • To identify needs for future clinical trials in vascular dementia research.

    Main Methods:

    • Review of randomized controlled trials on vascular dementia prevention and treatment.
    • Analysis of cerebrovascular risk factor reduction, including hypertension.
    • Evaluation of studies on cholinesterase inhibitors and memantine.

    Main Results:

    • Preventive strategies effectively reduce cerebrovascular risk factors and may prevent dementia by reducing stroke.
    • Disease-modifying treatments demonstrate real effects on vascular dementia progression.
    • Curative treatments like cholinesterase inhibitors and memantine show insufficient evidence for widespread use.

    Conclusions:

    • Prevention of vascular dementia through risk factor management is effective.
    • Current curative treatments for vascular dementia are largely ineffective.
    • Future research requires well-designed, adequately powered trials addressing disease heterogeneity and specific outcome measures.

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