Health Japanese study: owning a dog can ward off dementia 🐶

[thomas]

A study by the Tokyo Metropolitan Institute for Geriatrics and Gerontology, which analyzed nursing care insurance data of 11,194 elderly Tokyo residents from 2016 to 2020, revealed that owning a dog reduces the risk of dementia by 40%. The average participant age was 74.2; out of those, 959 owned dogs and 704 owned cats. The study found that dog owners had a significantly lower chance of developing dementia over the next four years than those without dogs, while cat ownership did not offer the same protective effect.

The probability of developing dementia was particularly low for dog owners who had a regular exercise habit and were not socially isolated. There were no significant differences between cat owners and non-feline owners. Researchers said dogs may have helped owners get exercise and connect with local residents during walks and other activities. The geriatrics and gerontology institute also said a separate study showed pet ownership helped elderly people reduce nursing care expenses by around half. The study was based on data for 460 elderly people in Hatoyama, Saitama Prefecture, with the average age of 77.7. Pets were owned by 96 subjects, or 20.9 percent. There were no significant differences in physical conditions, such as medical history and nursing care levels, between pet owners and non-pet owners.

The study, which concluded in June 2017 and had its findings published in February of the previous year, examined participants' medical and nursing care costs over an 18-month period. The research found no notable differences in healthcare spending between those who owned pets and those who did not. The study did not compare the expenses of dog owners to those of cat owners. Yu Taniguchi, a senior researcher at the National Institute for Environmental Studies and contributor to both studies, stated that having pets contributes to individual health and can help reduce public healthcare costs.

Study: Owning a dog, not a cat, can help fighting onset of dementia | The Asahi Shimbun: Breaking News, Japan News and Analysis

I concur with this: dogs give you a lot of exercise (come rain, storm, or snow) and facilitate connecting with other two-legged mammals.

 

[Grandpa Frank]

I'll stick with cats , LOL. As a child , I had terrible luck with dogs. My first 3 died too soon from illness and accidents. My first cat seemed to have 9 lives and lived to the ripe old age of 22. I've had cats for the last 35 years , but my 16 year old I have now will be the last. Between vet visits , special food and medicine , it's getting very expensive to own one. I do get to enjoy all the neighbor's dogs , seems almost every neighbor has a dog. I always have a few dog treats in my pocket when I go out to give when I get to greet them. Back when I was growing up , dogs ran free and often lived outside. Now you have to have them on a leash by law and have a fenced in yard to let them out in.

 

[salyavin]

Well so far I see no signs of dementia in grandpa frank based on his forum postings. Maybe the forum is the secret to warding off dementia

 

[mdchachi]

Well so far I see no signs of dementia in grandpa frank based on his forum postings. Maybe the forum is the secret to warding off dementia

Perhaps. But he's also not that old. My mother is exhibiting "cognitive decline" for a couple years now but she's 92.

 

[salyavin]

My father it is hard to tell his hearing is getting very bad which makes it hard to tell. We had him on a trial of hearing aides and he refused them and returned them pretty quickly. https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/hearing-aids-slow-cognitive-decline-people-high-risk He is a country boy with a gun collection who had neighbours complain he was shooting them in the air one day that was to test to make sure no one takes him to an old folks home. Not had any gun trouble since. He takes care of himself reasonably well though so no one wants to force him to go anywhere, the police were kind to him. His walk has become shuffling and he won't go on real walks and things it could maybe be a early sign of lewy body dementia or may be nothing at all but of course I won't go to a doctor, no one is putting me in a home to die. In addition to myself there are two other siblings of mine who live even closer to him than I do so at least he has that (my other sibling lives a plane ride away). None of us has any plans of forcing him to do anything.

My father in law had a sudden stroke March last year on girls day. Prior to that he was doing great exercising, learned to play guitar and joined a band after he couldn't be a pilot any more just bad luck. He woke up when we spent the summer there last year and was up in a chair and writing (paralyzed in one side) but went back to "sleep" after we left, we wonder how well that "home" cares for him but he gets visited twice a week. My mother in law is terrified of being very elderly alone (she is fine now) so pressure is slowly increasing for us to come back to japan. Right now I have it as a retirement plan (which cheap yen if it continues my american dollars would give us a higher quality of life there) thankfully my mother in law is very young, a lot younger than my father in law (who lied to her about his age until the wedding) she is only 69 and doing well. I could see myself ending up in a musicisgood type situation as I believe his wife wanted to come back to help with her parents.

 

[Grandpa Frank]

So far , my going into a room and wondering why I'm there isn't too common an occurrence. If I go into the bathroom and don't know why I'm there , it will be time to sell my gun collection , LOL. For years , I thought I'd die around 65 like most males in my family history did. Now , at 74 , I've decided I'm going to shoot for 93 years old. No clue why that age seems to be something to shoot for. I do try real hard to keep track of any failing cognitive issues I may develop. With firearms in my home , I don't want to ever take a chance on misusing them. If my wife or good friend neighbor advise me it's time for the funny farm , hopefully I will listen. My 17 years of home care nursing , with most patients elderly , gives me kind of an idea what's coming and signs to watch for.

 

[mdchachi]

My father it is hard to tell his hearing is getting very bad which makes it hard to tell. We had him on a trial of hearing aides and he refused them and returned them pretty quickly. https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/hearing-aids-slow-cognitive-decline-people-high-risk He is a country boy with a gun collection who had neighbours complain he was shooting them in the air one day that was to test to make sure no one takes him to an old folks home. Not had any gun trouble since. He takes care of himself reasonably well though so no one wants to force him to go anywhere, the police were kind to him. His walk has become shuffling and he won't go on real walks and things it could maybe be a early sign of lewy body dementia or may be nothing at all but of course I won't go to a doctor, no one is putting me in a home to die. In addition to myself there are two other siblings of mine who live even closer to him than I do so at least he has that (my other sibling lives a plane ride away). None of us has any plans of forcing him to do anything.

My father in law had a sudden stroke March last year on girls day. Prior to that he was doing great exercising, learned to play guitar and joined a band after he couldn't be a pilot any more just bad luck. He woke up when we spent the summer there last year and was up in a chair and writing (paralyzed in one side) but went back to "sleep" after we left, we wonder how well that "home" cares for him but he gets visited twice a week. My mother in law is terrified of being very elderly alone (she is fine now) so pressure is slowly increasing for us to come back to japan. Right now I have it as a retirement plan (which cheap yen if it continues my american dollars would give us a higher quality of life there) thankfully my mother in law is very young, a lot younger than my father in law (who lied to her about his age until the wedding) she is only 69 and doing well. I could see myself ending up in a musicisgood type situation as I believe his wife wanted to come back to help with her parents.

The difficulty with hearing makes it hard to tell. My mother gradually stopped doing things she used to do like pay her own bills, make her own tossed salads, making a grocery list, etc. And on top of that her short term memory is terrible. Like she'll ask me something and then ask the same question just a few minutes later in the same conversation. I give her supplies once/week. I have meals-on-wheels coming three times a week and am paying the lady next door to visit her twice a week and take her through her mobility exercises. And a family friend drops in once a week. And I have cameras in her house so I can make sure she hasn't fallen or something. So with all of that, somehow she's still able to live at home. Her dream, of course, is to die peacefully in her sleep at home. But I think most of us would prefer that too.

 

[Hiroyuki Nagashima]

My father is 91 years old, and there is cognitive impairment.
I keep 1-year-old Border collie and a 2-year-old wild cat in my home.
Father does not yet learn the name of the dog, but he minds it, and father talks to a dog every day from a house when I come home from the dog walking.
Another dog of my home is a speech recognition stuffed toy.
He talks to father at a table of the living every day.
As father is doing a conversation every day, I think that progress of the cognitive impairment is suppressed.