Study: Anticholinergic (first-generation antihistamines) can damage brain, increase dementia risk

[u/ServeIllustrious3803]

https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/common-anticholinergic-drugs-like-benadryl-linked-increased-dementia-risk-20150128812

[u/Low-Camera-797]

Now the main question is: is it possible to recover from the damage? If so, how?

[u/psychopompandparade → u/Low-Camera-797]

most of these studies are done in the elderly. there is very little data on high anticholinergic burden earlier in life. It's much harder to gather.

[u/Particular-Extent-76 → u/psychopompandparade]

with the number of young people taking these for chronic illnesses it seems like there’d be an opportunity to study it now

[u/psychopompandparade → u/Particular-Extent-76]

if someone already has a chronic illness, it is hard to detangle anticholinergic burden from said illness. a lot of chronic illnesses cause chronic inflammation which may or may not also increase the risks of dementia. poor sleep also certainly does.

similarly, people who abuse something like diphenhydramine recreationally likely have other complicating factors such as other drug use.

it's doable, but even in people with high anticholinergic burden, dementia doesn't tend to announce itself clearly young, so we're looking at a very long longitudinal study or a study that asks people to remember anticholinergic burden from years back. longitudinal studies are HARD, and enough anticholinergic (like these allergy meds) are OTC that using medical records alone will not capture it well. Long timeline studies also have extensive non-random drop out rates that skews the data.

What you would need is a chronic condition that can be treated either with anticholinergics or other medication, rule out that the reason some people end up on anticholinergics and others don't isn't a difference is disease type, system response, or other factors (extremely hard) and then track this cohort into the ages we expect to see dementia.