Scientists believe people who work in these two jobs have a lower risk of Alzheimer's
Much like hundreds of other occupations, which suggests that there may be a connection between jobs that require intense mental effort and the risk of developing dementia, a new study has discovered.
These drivers must memorize entire city street networks, requiring quick recall, and past studies in the UK show that London taxi drivers experience changes in the hippocampus over many years of navigating the city.
Alzheimer's disease is the most common form of dementia.
Researchers from Harvard Medical School examined Alzheimer's mortality rates for nearly 9 million individuals who passed away in the US between 2020 and 2022.
They identified 443 occupations, but focused on bus drivers, airplane pilots, and ship captains. This allowed them to compare taxi and ambulance drivers with other transportation jobs that don't rely on the same level of navigational skills.
Navigational activities may provide a level of protection
In the general population, 1.69 percent of all deaths were associated with Alzheimer's, much higher than the 1.03 percent for taxi and limousine drivers and 0.91 percent for ambulance drivers.
In other careers involving public transportation, Alzheimer's death rates were between 1.65% for bus drivers and 2.34% for airplane pilots when researchers considered factors such as age at death, sex, race, and ethnicity, and level of education.
"Our research suggests that repeatedly performing navigation and spatial tasks, common among taxi and ambulance drivers, may be linked to some degree of protection against Alzheimer's disease," the study's authors noted.
Dr. Anupam B. Jena, a professor at Harvard Medical School and the study's senior author, said that people should not turn off their GPS systems while driving as a way to keep their brains stimulated.
"They've honed the part of their brain that deals with super-charged, real-time navigation and spatial awareness over years and decades, particularly in situations that require minute-by-minute adjustments," Jena said.
The researchers also cautioned that the study does not establish cause-and-effect. It is also possible that people who are more skilled at navigating and processing geographic information are more likely to become taxi and ambulance drivers, which could mean they are less susceptible to Alzheimer's regardless of their occupation.
over 10 years.
Study limitations
However, she noted that other factors make it hard to "draw a direct line between occupation, the skills required to do a particular job, and the risk of death from Alzheimer’s disease".
Independent researchers noted several possible reasons, including the finding that taxi and ambulance drivers, who passed away on average at 64-67 years old, generally developed Alzheimer's disease at an age after 65.
In addition, only a small number of the drivers were women, who are generally more susceptible to developing Alzheimer’s than men, and the analysis did not take into account genetic factors or include tests that could have revealed any changes to the brain caused by their work.
the study's authors declared.
Even with these limitations, the results "emphasize the need for additional, more fundamental research on ways to safeguard our brains against Alzheimer's disease," Tara Spires-Jones, a dementia researcher and president of the British Neuroscience Association, stated.
Roughly 8 million people in the European Union have dementia, with Alzheimer's probably responsible for over half of those cases, as stated by Alzheimer Europe.
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