Free online CogDrisk tool to assess your dementia risk
While dementia remains Australia's most feared health condition, a revolutionary 15-minute test now offers hope of reducing your personal risk factors.
It’s the free 15-minute online tool designed by an Australian scientist that provides a personalised report on your risks of developing dementia.
Amid calls for greater brain health awareness,the CogDRisk tool provides users with data they can store and measure against by repeating the test regularly.
The evidence-backed cognitive health and dementia risk assessment self-testing tool was developed by Professor Kaarin Anstey, who is Director of the UNSW Ageing Futures Institute and conjoint senior principal research scientist at Neuroscience Research Australia (NeuRA).
“Dementia prevention is a whole new field, and a whole new way of thinking,” Prof Anstey told news.com.au.
“We’ve really completely changed the way we’re approaching brain health.
“We also talk more now about neuroplasticity, which is the fact that the brain is plastic right into very old age, and doing things like cognitive training and staying mentally active is really important for your brain health.”
“When I started my career, people didn’t talk about preventing dementia or risk reduction.
“It was assumed there was nothing you could do about whether or not a person was going to get dementia.”
Prof Anstey developed CogDrisk to give people a snapshot of their current risk factors. A PDF report is generated for people to print and take to the GP, and begin the conversation about addressing and lowering existing risk factors.
She said the tool came about from the desire to bring high-quality, evidence-backed research to the public in a way that empowers them.
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“There’s no point in me knowing all this stuff as an expert – it needs to get out to the public, and this tool is based on robust research,” she said.
“Every question has been linked properly to dementia risk in other cohort studies and the estimates we use, as well as all the statistics behind it, are based on very high-level research which has been published and validated on international studies.”
Since the launch of news.com.au and The Australian’s Think Again campaign, Prof Anstey said the response from those wanting to do the test has been overwhelming.
“We have been overwhelmed by the response from people wanting to take the CogDrisk assessment since Think Again was launched on Monday, which shows what a helpful tool it is,” she said.
“We want as many Australians as possible to use it so please do try again later if it’s taking too long.”
More than 50 per cent of Australians fear developing dementia, according to a survey of more 3000 people conducted earlier this year.
The Body&Soul Health of the Nation report, conducted by News Corp’s Growth Intelligence Centre, revealed it was our biggest health fear, particularly among women and older people.
Yet for something that casts such a shadow of dread, there remain several misconceptions among members of the public about what it actually is.
There are currently about 433,300 Australians living with dementia with that number set to pass one million by 2065, and the latest figures released last week reveal it is now the leasing cause of death for Australians.
The Lancet Commission on Dementia Prevention, Intervention, and Care identified 14 lifestyle modifiers that could almost halve dementia risk.
Risk factors include: obesity, smoking, heavy alcohol use, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, air pollution, hearing loss, untreated vision loss, not completing secondary education, social isolation, depression, a lack of physical activity, traumatic brain injury and type 2 diabetes.
Another useful tool for people wanting to take control of their brain health is Dementia Australia’s BrainTrack app.
The free app helps you monitor and understand changes in cognition over time.
“We developed BrainTrack as a tool for people who might be concerned about their memory or how they’re processing information,” Dementia Australia CEO Professor Tanya Buchanan said.
“You might have seen some cognitive changes, so you can download the app and track how you’re processing information and how your memory is. Then, you can then take to your GP as a bit of an indicator about changes over a period of time.”
And while empowerment is key, Prof Anstey acknowledges that, as with all prevention
campaigns, it’s crucial to understand there are multiple factors involved.
“I think it’s worth mentioning that there are people who are going to develop dementia despite having a healthy lifestyle,” she said.
“Just like there are people who get lung cancer who’ve never smoked, there will be people who develop dementia despite addressing these lifestyle modifiers, and we would never want those people to believe it was in any way their ‘fault’.”
She said the CogDrisk tool is about “keeping that balance,” between acting on the factors we can control, and encouraging people to feel more agency over their brain health.
“Ultimately, we want to empower people with as many tools as we can to improve brain health across the entire population.”
Originally published as Free online CogDrisk tool to assess your dementia risk
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