Diabetes causes accelerated aging

Scientists at the State University of New York at Stony Brook have shown that advanced type 2 diabetes accelerates normal aging by 26 percent compared to those who do not have the disease. The results of the study are published in the journal eLife.

The researchers assessed the relationship between typical brain aging and that seen in type 2 diabetes. They analyzed a dataset of brain structure and function across the lifespan of 20,000 people aged 50 to 80. They determined which brain and cognitive changes are characteristic of diabetes, not just aging, and then confirmed these results by comparing them with a meta-analysis of nearly 100 other studies.

It turned out that age-related neurodegeneration progresses faster in diabetes. Significant structural damage can occur in the brain even before a diagnosis is made. There was a decrease in the gray matter of the brain with age, mainly in an area called the ventral striatum, which became more pronounced with diabetes.

Both aging and type 2 diabetes cause changes in cognitive functions such as working memory, learning, mental flexibility, and also affect the speed of the brain’s processing of data. However, in people with diabetes, cognitive function declined by an additional 13.1 percent on top of age-related effects, and their processing speed further decreased by 6.7 percent.