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Women And African Americans Are More Likely To Develop Alzheimer's And Dementia - Why?

Women are more likely than men to suffer from Alzheimer's disease — one of many discrepancies in diagnoses that scientists are investigating.
SEBASTIEN BOZON/AFP/Getty Images
Women are more likely than men to suffer from Alzheimer's disease — one of many discrepancies in diagnoses that scientists are investigating.

More than five million Americans have Alzheimer’s disease or a similar form of dementia. African Americans are two to three times more likely to develop Alzheimer’s than white Americans.

Yet African Americans account for only three to five percent of clinical Alzheimer’s trial participants.

Two-thirds of Americans with Alzheimer’s and dementia are women. Women do live longer, but biological and hormonal changes specific to women may also play a role.

Why some groups get Alzheimer’s more frequently than others and efforts to raise awareness and provide more support to women and African Americans with Alzheimer’s and their caregivers.

GUESTS

Marita Golden, Journalist and author; her latest novel, “The Wide Circumference of Love,” is about an African American family dealing with Alzheimer’s; president and founder of the Zora Neale Hurston-Richard Wright Foundation

Jill Lesser, President, Women Against Alzheimer’s; board member, US Against Alzheimer’s

For more, visit http://the1a.org.

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