Study: high blood pressure boosts Alzheimer's risk

Now here's another good reason to keep taking that blood pressure medication! Interesting article!

Source: http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90782/90880/6312161.html

Alzheimer's patients with high blood pressure, which reduces blood flow to the brain, are more vulnerable to the effects of the disease, researchers reported Wednesday.

Researchers using a magnetic resonance imaging technique to measure blood flow in the brains of 68 older adults found cerebral blood flow was substantially decreased in all patients with high blood pressure and was the lowest in Alzheimer's patients with high blood pressure.

"What we think may be happening is hypertension reflects an extra hit to the brain," said Cyrus Raji of the University of Pittsburgh, who led the study.

The study compared Alzheimer patients to adults with normal cognitive function and a group with mild cognitive impairment, defined as a transitional stage between dementia and normal, age-related deficits in language, attention and reasoning.