Scientists warn how a simple heartburn pill could be changing your brain chemistry
One of the most common forms of medication could actually be impacting your brain chemistry, as scientists warn about the potential dangers and risks associated with taking a simple heartburn pill.
General cognitive decline is something that's expected as we age, yet health experts are fighting a continuous battle against specific diseases without any potential cure possible right now.
Unexpected methods have been tested and proposed that claim to reverse the effects of diseases like Altzheimer's – potentially also slowing down the development before it even occurs within the brain – yet scientists are also conducting further research into the causes and triggers of the often deadly disease.
As per Psychiatrist.com, new research emerging from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) study has suggested a potential link between heartburn medication and the increased risk of developing demenia, revealing that the drugs could be altering your brain chemistry.
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These pills, also known as proton pump inhibitors (PPIs), treat acid reflux and heartburn by suppressing the production of gastric acid within the body, which can also lead to esophageal cancer down the line if not treated properly.
They are among the most widely taken forms of medication across the world – especially in the United States – yet the new research published in Neurology indicates that it could be impacting your brain in ways you might not expect.
Tracking over 5,700 older adults in a study that began all the way back in the late 1980s, the research charts the impact of PPI use across different time periods, with 'short-term' indicating a period between 1 day and 2.8 years, 'medium-term' between 2.8 years and 4.4 years, and then 'long-term' representing any period over 4.4 years.
Within that group of participants there have been 585 diagnosed cases of dementia, leading researchers not to link any current PPI use with the cognitive disease, but outline the increased danger that long-term consumption has to your brain.
Anyone falling into the long-term group – having over 4 years of cumulative PPI use – possessed a 33 per cent greater risk of developing dementia in their brain compared to people who have never taken heartburn medication, showing quite how much of an impact it can have over a longer period of time.
"While we did not find a link with short-term use," explained Kamakshi Lakshminarayan, lead author of the study, "we did find a higher risk of dementia associated with long-term use of these drugs.
"These findings underscore the importance of limiting intake by the principle of 'as needed, as short as possible'."
It also outlines the balance between fighting off the cancer-developing implications of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) sufferers with the dangers associated with the treating medications, but it appears as if the solution is a more topical one than any form of regular, long-term consumption.