Gaby
We spend a third of our lives asleep, often accompanied by dreams. Yet, despite the central role dreams play in our lives, we still know surprisingly little about why we dream, how our brains create these dreams, and most importantly, what significance they may hold for our health—especially for our brain health. This is particularly true for nightmares.
A team of neurologists at the University of Birmingham (UK), led by Abidemi Otaiku, found that dreams can reveal a surprising amount about brain health.
The researchers found that frequent nightmares—those bad dreams that wake a person up—in middle and older age may be linked to an increased risk of developing dementia.
Nightmares are a common sleep disorder and can signal problems with mental and physical health.
How Was the Study Conducted?
The team analyzed data from three large studies focused on the health and aging of U.S. residents. The analysis included over 600 individuals aged 35 to 64 and 2,600 individuals aged 79 and older.
At the start of the study, none of the volunteers had dementia. The researchers followed the middle-aged group for nine years and the older participants for five years.
Volunteers completed a series of questionnaires, including questions about how often they experienced nightmares. The scientists then analyzed whether participants who reported frequent nightmares at the beginning of the study were more likely to experience cognitive decline, particularly rapid memory loss and deterioration of thinking skills, up to a dementia diagnosis.
What Did the Researchers Discover?
The study found that middle-aged participants who experienced weekly nightmares were four times more likely than those without nightmares to show cognitive decline (a precursor to dementia) over the next decade. Meanwhile, among older participants who suffered from bad dreams, dementia was diagnosed twice as often as among those without nightmares.
The correlation between nightmares and future dementia was stronger in men than in women.
For instance, older men who had weekly nightmares were five times more likely to develop dementia compared with older men who reported no bad dreams. In contrast, the risk for women increased by 41 percent. A similar pattern was observed in the middle-aged group.
Overall, these results suggest that frequent nightmares may be an early sign of dementia. Nightmares could accelerate the onset of memory and thinking problems by several years or even decades, particularly in men, as reported by Science Alert.
The good news is that recurring nightmares are now treatable. Some treatments for recurring nightmares have been shown to reduce the accumulation of abnormal proteins in the brain linked to Alzheimer’s disease.
Future research by the team of neurologists will investigate whether nightmares in younger individuals are linked to an increased risk of developing dementia.
This study shed new light on the connection between dreaming and potential dementia and highlighted the need for timely diagnosis and possibly earlier medical intervention.
The findings were published in The Lancet.
