Longitudinal analysis of risk factors for dementia based on Mild Cognitive Impairment Screen results and questionnaire responses from healthy Japanese individuals registered in an online database

INTRODUCTION: Despite an urgent need for developing remedial measures against dementia, no disease-modifying drugs have been developed. Efficient protocols for participant recruitment need to be established for conducting clinical trials. To meet this need, a large-scale online registry system, the Integrated Registry of Orange Plan (IROOP®), was created for healthy individuals. Although the risk factors for dementia have been discussed in our previous studies for a short interval of 6 months, some factors remain controversial. The present study aimed to explore factors affecting longitudinal changes in cognitive function for a longer interval of 18 months using the IROOP® data. METHODS: This study assessed the longitudinal changes in the collated data for predicting the risk of dementia and included 473 individuals (175 men and 298 women; mean age 59.6 ± 10.1 years) registered in the IROOP® between July 5, 2016 and January 15, 2018 who completed the initial questionnaire and brief assessment of cognitive function (Mild Cognitive Impairment Screen) at baseline and the regular questionnaire and the Mild Cognitive Impairment Screen at least once after baseline. Statistical analyses were performed using IBM SPSS, version 23.0, for Windows for demographic data and the MIXED procedure in SAS, version 9.4, for the linear mixed-effect model. In each analysis, the statistical significance level was set at P < .05. RESULTS: Mood, sleep, quality of life, and medical histories including cognition were found to influence longitudinal changes in cognitive function. DISCUSSION: Given the multifactorial etiology of dementia, preventive measures targeting multiple domains are required for maintaining cognitive function, instead of focusing on one lifestyle factor.