Nuns contribute 30 years of critical insight into dementia disorders, UT Health San Antonio study reveals
Posted on: Friday, February 28th, 2025
Catholic nuns don’t make a habit of participating in long-term studies on aging and dementia, but one notable exception has yielded critical insights into cognitive resilience, neuropathology and aging-related disorders.
Researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (UT Health San Antonio) published a study analyzing more than 30 years of aging and dementia patterns of 678 nuns from the School Sisters of Notre Dame enrolled in the aptly named Nun Study, conceived by epidemiologist and neurology professor David A. Snowdon, PhD, in 1986.
It now is housed at UT Health San Antonio’s Glenn Biggs Institute for Alzheimer’s and Neurodegenerative Diseases, under the direction of Margaret Flanagan, MD, tenured associate professor of pathology and laboratory medicine.
Among takeaways from this latest analysis: Some individuals showed resilience to cognitive decline despite an Alzheimer’s diagnosis, indicating unknown protective mechanisms at work, and that early-life linguistic ability and grammatical complexity correlated with a lower risk of impairment in later life.
Also, advanced digital pathology techniques and artificial intelligence are reshaping the study of Alzheimer’s and related dementias. It all portends advancement for preventive intervention in cognitive decline.
Read the full article at UT Health San Antonio’s Newsroom.