TOPLINE:

Disclosure of amyloid‑beta PET results to inform cognitively unimpaired older adults about their risk for dementia was not associated with significant changes in self‑reported health behaviors 7 months later, a new study showed. However, 86% reported progress on individual brain health goals.

METHODOLOGY:

• The current cohort study included data collected from the Wisconsin Registry for Alzheimer’s Prevention between 2020 and 2023 for 99 cognitively unimpaired older adults (mean age, 72 years; 68% female; 95% White) who received amyloid‑beta PET results and completed a dementia risk-reduction counseling visit.
• Overall, 28% of participants were amyloid‑beta-positive and 72% were negative; 98% completed follow-up assessments.
• During the visit, clinicians reviewed brain health recommendations, discussed participants’ medical history, and helped them to set a brain health-focused goal. The participants completed validated self-report measures of physical, cognitive, social, and stress-reduction activity; diet; and sleep quality before the disclosure of PET results and again 7 months later.
• The primary outcome was change in health behavior from pre-disclosure to post-disclosure. Other outcomes included differences in behavior between amyloid‑beta result groups and progress on brain health goals.

TAKEAWAY:

• Participants reported a greater likelihood of making lifestyle changes to improve brain health at follow-up compared to baseline (P = .02).
• Cognitive activity significantly decreased at follow-up (P < .001), but there were no significant changes in physical or social activity, diet, stress reduction activity, or sleep quality.
• Participants in the amyloid‑beta-negative group reported better sleep quality scores at follow-up than those in the positive group (P = .03), whereas there were no significant between-group differences in physical or social activity, diet, cognitive or stress reduction activity, or likelihood to make behavior changes.
• Overall, 86% of all participants reported progress on individual brain health goals; 48.5% met or exceeded their goal, and 37.5% made some progress. No difference in goal progress was observed between the two amyloid-beta groups.

IN PRACTICE:

“The discrepancy between earlier descriptive reports of increased behavior changes after receiving elevated amyloid PET results and the current findings suggests personalized health behavior measures that vary across individuals may be necessary to adequately capture progress,” the investigators of the study wrote.

“Alternatively, people may desire dementia risk reduction but encounter barriers to health behavior changes,” they added.

SOURCE:

The study was led by Lindsay R. Clark, PhD, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, Wisconsin. It was published online on December 1 in JAMA Network Open.

LIMITATIONS:

The study was limited by potential bias in available measures and reduced generalizability because of sample bias.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was funded by the National Institute on Aging, the University of Wisconsin-Madison Department of Medicine, and the University of Wisconsin Initiative to End Alzheimer’s Innovation Fund. Several investigators reported having financial or other ties with organizations, including pharmaceutical companies, outside the submitted work. Full details are provided in the original article.

This article was created using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication.