May 5, 2025 – The list of ways to reduce your dementia risk just keeps getting longer.
Some are big efforts (meditation or distance running), while others are small (gardening, walking, eating blueberries).
But they're all part of a "powerful shift in how we think about dementia, and especially Alzheimer's disease," said behavioral neurologist Silky Pahlajani, MD, a professor at Weill Cornell Medicine/New York Presbyterian in New York City.
Dementia is "no longer just something that happens with age, but now is known to be a condition influenced by multiple factors," said Pahlajani. "Those risk factors accumulate over decades before memory symptoms even appear. That's a big, very important revelation."
The consistent theme: What's good for your body is also good for your brain.
Four recent studies, all published in the last few weeks, build on this trend, offering new evidence-backed ways for you to boost your physical health while also potentially lowering your risk of dementia.
1. Get enough of the right type of sleep.
Quality sleep has long been linked with reduced dementia risk – not to mention improvements in mood, immunity, blood sugar, heart health, and weight. But a new study zeroes in on the right kind of sleep for Alzheimer's prevention.
"This study shows that deep sleep, which is a slow-wave sleep, and REM sleep are two stages that play a very important role in clearing brain toxins and supporting memory networks," said Pahlajani, who wasn't involved in the research.
Not getting enough deep sleep and REM sleep, especially in midlife, is related to shrinkage in a part of the brain that's particularly vulnerable in Alzheimer's, the study found.
Deep sleep and REM sleep are signs of sleep quality, not quantity. "So when people say they get an adequate number of hours, that's not enough," Pahlajani said. "It's about how well someone is sleeping."
How do you know if you're getting enough deep and REM sleep? Start by keeping a sleep diary of when you go to sleep and when you wake up, said Sudha Seshadri, MD, director of the Glenn Biggs Institute for Alzheimer's and Neurodegenerative Diseases at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. When you wake up, grab a pen and check in with yourself.
"How did you feel after your sleep? Did you feel it was restful?" Seshadri said. "Look at whether you feel sleepy during the day, because dropping off to sleep, even in situations where people typically would not, can be a sign that the sleep at night is not restorative."
Sleep-tracking smartwatches or under-the-mattress sleep sensors are fine to use, she said. These can estimate how much time you spent in different sleep stages. Collect several days' or weeks' worth of data and review it with your doctor.
2. Take the easiest class at the rec center.
You'd think that a hard workout would be better than an easy one – but maybe not. New findings just published in the journal Alzheimer's & Dementia found little difference.
The study compared cognitive decline (a problem with thinking skills) in people who did moderate- to high-intensity workouts versus those who did low-intensity stretching, balance, and range-of-motion activities at the YMCA three or four times per week for a year.
All the people in the study already had mild memory problems; specifically, trouble remembering new facts and events. The condition puts people at high risk of dementia. But neither group showed signs of further cognitive decline. The halt in decline persisted when the people in the study kept doing the workouts for six more months without a YMCA trainer helping them, for a total stable period of 18 months.
The study "is the largest rigorous clinical trial of exercise ever conducted in adults with mild cognitive impairment," said researcher Laura Baker, PhD, a professor of gerontology and geriatric medicine at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. "Exercise has well-documented benefits for nearly every aspect of human health, but we're still unlocking the full potential of exercise as medicine for older adults with memory problems."
3. Target your cholesterol count.
Keeping your LDL cholesterol low could dramatically reduce your risk of dementia – and statins can offer other benefits for those who qualify.
People whose LDL cholesterol was below 70 mg/dL had a 26% reduced risk of dementia and a 28% reduced risk of Alzheimer's specifically, compared to people whose LDL was 130 mg/dL or higher, according to new research.
That kind of risk reduction would be "comparable to some of the most effective lifestyle intervention modifications that we know," said Michael Dobbs, MD, a professor of neuroscience and associate dean of clinical affairs at Florida Atlantic University.
For comparison, regular physical activity has been linked to a 30% lower dementia risk. Managing blood pressure or blood sugar offers less than that, he said. "So these LDL findings are in kind of the top tier of impactful prevention tools if it bears out. It's pretty exciting."
Among people with an LDL level below 70 mg/dL, those who also were taking a statin had up to a 13% additional reduced dementia risk, compared to non-statin users.
Why does it work? Research shows that LDL cholesterol plays a role in the decline of the nervous system, said Dobbs, who is an expert in stroke neurology. Our brain is full of lipids, he said, "and since cholesterol is made from lipids, it affects inflammation and blood flow through the brain, including the small arteries."
Because plaque buildup in arteries is partly due to inflammation, it makes sense that taking statins – which have anti-inflammatory properties – would reduce plaque buildup in the brain, lowering dementia risk.
"There may very well be more to it, including reduction in some of the disordered proteins that can cause Alzheimer's disease and similar conditions," said Dobbs, who wasn't involved in this latest study. "You may actually see a reduction in formation of those proteins with statins. But I do want to be clear: That needs a lot more research before we really draw that conclusion."
4. For some, diabetes drugs can help protect the brain.
If you have type 2 diabetes and you're north of 50, this finding matters to you: Taking a GLP-1 or a SGLT2i (two types of diabetes medications) was linked to a 33%-43% lower risk of Alzheimer's or a related dementia. The average age of the people in the study was around 65.
Watch out for hype about GLP-1s – like Ozempic – and dementia prevention, though, said Diana Thiara, MD, medical director of the Weight Management Program at the University of California San Francisco. She authored an editorial alongside the new GLP-1 and SGLT2i studies in the journal JAMA Neurology. The new research isn't large enough or rigorous enough to prompt insurance companies to change their coverage policies, she said, but it may impact conversations between doctors and type 2 diabetes patients.
"We're at this cusp of really big changes and progress being made in things like dementia and obesity care, which historically haven't had good options," Thiara said. "But there's also sort of a craze and a fanaticism around it."
Two randomized controlled trials, called EVOKE and EVOKE Plus, are underway to better see how taking the GLP-1 semaglutide (the generic form of Ozempic) impacts cognitive decline. The studies will wrap up in October 2026.
"What we know is that really focusing on your cardiometabolic health and reducing cholesterol and improving sleep and all of that, it all goes together," Thiara said. "By reducing your risk of diabetes and heart attacks and strokes, you're reducing your risk of developing dementia, and vice versa."
