Dementia is an umbrella term for memory loss and other thinking abilities severe enough to interfere with daily life. What is your risk of developing Dementia?
The best way to prevent dementia is to understand your risk and minimize dementia risk factors by making healthy lifestyle
The Project Big Life Dementia Calculator predicts your five-year risk of being diagnosed with dementia for individuals who are 55 years of age and older, live in the community (i.e., not in long-term care or retirement home) and have not already been diagnosed with dementia.
The Dementia Population Risk Tool (DemPoRT) is the predictive risk algorithm that powers the Project Big Life Dementia Calculator.
The Dementia Calculator was developed to help community-dwelling adults 55 years of age and older better understand their brain health and the things they can do to reduce their risk of developing dementia.
The DemPoRT algorithm was developed using anonymized Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS) data of 50,000 Ontarians aged 55 years and older, linked to administrative health care data to ascertain the five-year development of dementia. Using variables associated with the development of dementia, risk prediction models were developed for males and females separately. The factors included in the models are age and other sociodemographic characteristics, lifestyle behaviours, general health and physical functioning. The resulting model was then tested in a separate set of CCHS data from 25,000 Ontarians aged 55 years and older to find out how well it predicts dementia incidence. We found that the model performed well overall and in a wide range of population subgroups. More details about how the DemPoRT algorithm was developed and validated can be found in the study protocol and the scientific journal article.
Researchers at the Ottawa Hospital, the University of Ottawa, the Bruyère Research Institute and ICES developed the DemPoRT algorithm and the Project Big Life Dementia Calculator in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
Individuals with a family history of dementia and/or certain genetic mutations are more likely to be diagnosed with dementia. As data about these risk factors was not collected in the survey data used to create the DemPoRT model, we are currently unable to use this information to inform the dementia risk and brain age estimates
This work was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and supported by ICES which is funded by an annual grant from the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care.
