title: Adult asthma increases dementia risk: a nationwide cohort study.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Studies on the association between adult asthma and dementia are few. We investigated the risk of dementia in patients diagnosed with adult asthma compared with that of people without asthma who were age and sex matched to the study patients.
  
  
  METHODS
  We used data from the National Health Insurance Research Database. A total of 12 771 patients with newly diagnosed asthma between 2001 and 2003 were evaluated and 51 084 people without asthma were used as the comparison cohort. Cox proportional hazard regression analysis was used to measure the HR of dementia for the asthmatic cohort, compared with that of the non-asthmatic cohort.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The HR of dementia was 1.27 (95% confidence interval (CI) 1.15 to 1.41) for the asthmatic cohort, compared with the non-asthmatic cohort after adjusting for age, sex, comorbidities, annual outpatient department visits and medicine used. The HR of dementia development increased substantially as frequency of asthma exacerbation and hospitalisation increased.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This nationwide cohort study suggests that the risk of dementia development is significantly increased in patients with asthma compared with that of the general population. In addition, dementia risk increases substantially with asthma exacerbation and hospitalisation frequency increases.
authors.affiliation: Department of Respiratory Therapy, China Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Yi-Hao
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: Peng
authors.affiliation: China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine, China Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Biing-Ru
authors.initials: BR
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine, Section of Respiratory Therapy, Changhua Christian Hospital, Changhua, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Ching-Hua
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Su
authors.affiliation: China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine, China Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Wei-Chih
authors.initials: WC
authors.lastname: Liao
authors.affiliation: Management Office for Health Data, China Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan Graduate Institute of Clinical Medical Science and School of Medicine, College of Medicine, China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Chih-Hsin
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Muo
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine, China Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan Department of Respiratory Therapy, China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Te-Chun
authors.initials: TC
authors.lastname: Hsia
authors.affiliation: Graduate Institute of Clinical Medical Science and School of Medicine, College of Medicine, China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan Department of Nuclear Medicine and PET Center, China Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Chia-Hung
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Kao
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001249:Asthma / Q000453:epidemiology*; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D015897:Comorbidity; D006259:Craniocerebral Trauma / Q000453:epidemiology*; D003704:Dementia / Q000453:epidemiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D020521:Stroke / Q000453:epidemiology*; D013624:Taiwan / Q000453:epidemiology; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: ASTHMA; Cohort studies; DEMENTIA