LGBTQ+ people may be more prone to poor brain health in later life

People belonging to the LGBTQ+ community may have a higher risk of dementia and late-life depression compared to people who are cisgender and straight, according to a new study.

Researchers in the United States analysed data from over 390,000 people looking to identify people suffering from neurological conditions such as depression, dementia, late-life depression, and stroke.

After adjusting for other factors such as age, smoking, or high blood pressure, LGBTQ+ people were 15 per cent more likely to develop negative brain health outcomes, according to the study published in the journal Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

They found that people belonging to a “sexual and gender minority” had 14 per cent higher odds of suffering from dementia and 27 per cent higher odds of suffering from late-life depression.

“In a world that increasingly recognises the crucial role of equitable health care, it remains concerning how little is known about the health disparities faced by LGBTQ+ people,” one of the study’s authors Shufan Huo from the Yale School of Medicine in the US, said in a statement. 

“Our study looked at this group, which has been historically underrepresented in neurological research, and found that they had an increased risk of adverse brain health outcomes”.

More research needed to explore the underlying causes

When listing the different characteristics needed for their analysis, researchers noted that “the prevalence of smoking, substance use disorder, and HIV infection was higher” among the people belonging to the LGBTQ+ community. 

Researchers also found that transgender women had a 68 per cent higher risk of stroke compared to cisgender individuals, while no increased risk was observed for other groups.

“Our findings underscore the need for further research focusing on the health care disparities affecting the LGBTQ+ community,” Huo said. 

“Possible reasons for these disparities could include discrimination, stress, access to health care and policy and legal factors”.

A limitation of the study was that it did not explore the underlying causes and mechanisms behind the disparities experienced by LGBTQ+ individuals.