A half century of dementia research: traversing biology, epidemiology, and public health

Dementia is the seventh leading cause of death and a major cause of disability and dependency among older adults worldwide.

Disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) due to dementia more than doubled over the past 20-years, representing the biggest rate of increase among the Top 30 causes of DALYs.

Faced with only limited progress on disease-modifying treatments, there is increasing consensus, also from leading Swedish research institutions, that interventions targeting dementia prevention may be the way forward.Through this one-day symposium, we intend to bring together a number of leading international experts in the prevention of dementia from the biological (i.e., neuropathological mechanisms), epidemiological (i.e., observational studies), and public health (i.e., interventional studies) perspectives.

With support from established national researchers in the field of dementia, the symposium aims to stimulate discussion, reflection and cooperation in a unique multidisciplinary and international context.

As part of the symposium, the scientific achievements of Professor Laura Fratiglioni, who is nearing her retirement, will be acknowledged for her unmatched dedication to dementia prevention research.The symposium is preliminarily scheduled for October 2025 and will be organized by a multidisciplinary group of experts from the Aging Research Center.

The symposium will take place on site at Karolinska Institutet with around 100 participants, as well as online. The scientific contributions of invited speakers will also form the basis of a review paper following the event.

The applied grant will cover the costs for symposium coordination and implementation, travel and accommodation for international speakers, infrastructure, as well as the completion of the review article.