Are There Any New Treatments for Dementia?

elderly woman with dementia with caregiver

Summary: Yes, there are new treatments for dementia and a new understanding of dementia that can delay onset and extend independence for people with Alzheimer’s disease and associated cognitive decline, a.k.a. dementia.

Key Points:

  • Alzheimer’s related dementia affects over 7 million people in the U.S. over age 65
  • Experts predict that number will double over the next 25 years.
  • Close to 12 million family members provide care to family members with dementia each year in the U.S.
  • New information indicates several ways to slow cognitive decline and dementia, when signs and symptoms are identified early

Dementia in the U.S. Affects Individuals, Families, and Communities

In addition to Alzheimer’s disease, several other conditions can cause cognitive decline/dementia, including:

  • Cerebrovascular disease
  • Frontotemporal degeneration (FTD)
  • Hippocampal sclerosis (HS)
  • Lewy body disease
  • Parkinson’s diseases (PD)

In all cases of dementia, the impact means a gradual reduction in the ability to manage basic activities of daily living, called ADLs. As a result, family members and others are required to assist people with dementia with complete basic activities such as:

  • Getting up and sitting down
  • Getting in an out of bed
  • Bathing
  • Dressing
  • Using the restroom
  • Eating
  • Grooming

Eventually, most people with dementia will need help with all of these activities, because Alzheimer’s disease is not curable. Before we discuss the new information available on dementia treatment, let’s make sure we know exactly what we’re talking about.

Here’s how experts describe dementia in the report “2025 Alzheimer’s Disease Facts and Figures”:

“Dementia is an overall term for a particular group of symptoms, and Alzheimer’s disease is one cause of dementia symptoms. Symptoms of dementia include trouble with memory, language and problem‐solving, difficulty concentrating, problems understanding and expressing thoughts, confusion, poor judgment, and impulsivity.”

While people with Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia have good days and days that could be better, new developments can help increase the number of good days and decrease the number of days in need of improvement.

Identifying Signs and Symptoms, Mitigating Risk Factors

The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published a short multimedia presentation and discussion called “A New Era in Dementia – Advances in Diagnostic Blood Tests, Novel Drugs, and the Power of Lifestyle Changes” which included an extended discussion on the topic of dementia with a leading expert in the field, Dr. Gil Rabinovici, the current director of the University of California San Francisco Alzheimer Disease Research Center.

While acknowledging the significant disruption caused by dementia and the impact on individuals and families, Dr. Rabinovici emphasizes the following:

Early and accurate diagnosis can greatly aid management and improve outcomes. That includes identifying and addressing risk factors as soon as any symptoms, or detection of biomarkers, appear in diagnostic assessments.

When discussing the risk factors associated with dementia, experts identify two categories: unmodifiable and modifiable. Dr. Rabinovici indicates the unmodifiable risk factors for dementia are age and genetics. He also identifies several risk factors that are modifiable, but nevertheless associated with nearly half of dementia cases:

  • Poorly controlled hypertension
  • Poorly controlled diabetes
  • Obesity
  • Physical inactivity
  • Smoking
  • Excessive drinking
  • Social isolation
  • Depression

Less common risk factors for dementia – which illustrate the complex interplay of biology, environment, and experience – include the following:

  • Low educational attainment
  • Chronic stress
  • Air pollution
  • Socioeconomic status

When a person is aging, family members may be the best qualified to identify these risk factors, because it’s easy for an individual to downplay problems, hope issues aren’t as serious as they really are, and defer going to the doctor out of fear/anxiety about what they may learn. That’s a difficult paradox to navigate, but we encourage family members to stand their ground and get their loved one to a qualified provider as soon as they see any signs and symptoms – e.g. memory problems, confusion, impulsivity – that may indicate an onset of dementia.

Knowing there’s a problem can help fix, delay, or mitigate the negative consequences of that problem, and learning there’s not a problem can be a big relief. In either case, getting to a qualified provider for a complete evaluation is essential.

The Importance of Daily Habits in Delaying Onset of Dementia Symptoms

Once an individual or family knows what’s going on with their loved one, they can take the appropriate steps to address the presence of dementia and related physical, emotional, psychological, and functional consequences.

The contemporary approach to dementia focuses on advances in precision medication, which we’ll discuss below, and lifestyle factors. New research shows that changes in lifestyle have a significant impact on dementia, including:

  • Healthy eating
  • Regular exercise and activity
  • Regular cognitive engagement, i.e. activity, interactions, and behavior that require critical thinking skills and decision-making, which can include:
    • Games: cards, board games, pétanque, others
    • Music: playing, learning
    • Learning: hobbies, skills, ideas
  • Social activity
  • Responsible management of chronic conditions

In addition to advances in our understanding of how lifestyle affects dementia, there have been recent breakthroughs in how we detect and treat dementia from a biomedical perspective.

Testing and Medications for Dementia: New Developments

New tests and medications include but are not limited to:

  • Testing:
    • New tests can accurately identify biomarkers associated with increased risk of Alzheimer’s disease and associated dementia
    • Early identification of these biomarkers allows doctors to prescribe lifestyle changes that can delay the onset of Alzheimer’s and dementia
  • Disease modifying medications such as lecanemab and donanemab can reduce unwanted chemical buildup in brain associated with dementia, which do not reverse or cure dementia, but can:
    • Slow rate of cognitive decline by 30%
    • Increase length of independence for people with mild impairment associated with dementia

While these two new medications – lecanemab and donanemab – are based on the presentation of monoclonal antibodies into the bloodstream and brain of patients with dementia, there are still questions about their overall safety. Random controlled trials (RCTs) conducted between 2021 and 2024 showed significant risks associated with the medications. However, a review by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) concluded the benefits of these medications warranted making them available to patients, and both have received FDA approval, and require special and frequent monitoring by a skilled and experienced medical team.

The safety issues raise legitimate questions that each patient and family should address openly, honestly, and directly with any providing physician, in order to make an informed decision based on the latest evidence from scientific studies.

Those aren’t easy decisions to make, and require real collaboration between patients, families, and providers. However, decisions that are not hard to make revolve around lifestyle. The latest evidence shows that with early detection, making lifestyle modifications sooner, rather than later, can delay the onset of dementia and improve the experience of individuals with dementia and the family members who care for them every day.

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