Relationships Among Dementia, Parental Death, and Other Adverse Childhood Experiences: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Examining risk factors for the development of dementia, a devastating condition, is of increasing importance in clinical research. Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) represent one set of potentially modifiable dementia risk factors with known impacts on neurodevelopment and health. Refining approaches used in previous reviews, the authors of this review and meta-analysis sought to answer the question, What is the strength of the association between ACEs and dementia in later life? The authors searched PubMed, EMBASE, and Web of Science, including peer-reviewed studies involving adults exposed to ACEs and a comparison group of unexposed adults. The outcome of interest was dementia of any etiology, and study quality was assessed. Separate meta-analyses were performed with odds ratios and hazard ratios (HRs). The literature search yielded 2,032 articles, of which 13 were included for analysis. ACE exposure (OR=1.54, 95% CI=1.38-1.71, p<0.001; HR=1.51, 95% CI=1.24-1.84, p<0.001) and exposure to parental death in childhood (OR=1.42, 95% CI=1.16-1.74, p<0.001) were associated with increased odds of or risk for developing dementia, respectively. This meta-analytic review is the most extensive examination of the ACE-dementia relationship to date, and its findings suggest that several ACEs are associated with increased dementia odds and risk. Although the number of studies reviewed was small and the studies were mostly of fair quality, necessitating caution in interpretation, nearly all of their results supported the association between ACE and dementia. High-quality prospective cohort studies incorporating biomarkers to measure ACE outcomes will be essential.