A study initiated by the University of Michigan Health System revealed that lack of adequate vision coverage of older adults may render them at increased vulnerability of Alzheimer's disease - the most common form of dementia.

The study appears online ahead of print in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

Scientists scanned people's brains to depict that hypertension add to a kind of scarring which later results in the development of Alzheimer's disease and other dementias. Those scars can start building up in middle age, decades before memory problems will appear.

The study, which used Medicare data, reflected that those suffering with inadequate vision who visited an ophthalmologist at least once for an examination were 64 per cent less prone to develop dementia.

"Visual problems can have serious consequences and are very common among the elderly, but many of them are not seeking treatment", says lead author Mary A. M. Rogers, Ph. D.

To reach the conclusion, Rogers and her colleague Kenneth M. Langa, M. D., Ph. D., professor of internal medicine at U-M Medical School, is reported to have analyzed information from the nationally representative Health and Retir.