Check your dementia risk: the factors you can change

Let's be honest about the thing you actually want: nobody can tell you whether you'll get dementia. No online test, no quiz, no risk score. Age is the biggest factor and you can't change it, and any product promising a personal forecast is overselling. Here's what you can do, and why it's genuinely worth doing: the 2024 Lancet Commission links around 45% of dementia cases worldwide to 14 modifiable risk factors — things like blood pressure, hearing, activity, sleep, mood and connection. You can find out where you stand across those in about three minutes. That's not a prediction. It's a map of where your effort pays off — which is far more useful than a number you can't act on.

What a dementia risk check is — and what it isn't

Three different things get muddled together online, and separating them makes everything clearer:

• A memory test looks backward and inward — is something changing right now? That's the right tool if you or your family have noticed symptoms. Our guide to checking your memory at home covers the free, validated self-checks and what they can (and can't) tell you.
• A clinical diagnosis comes only from a doctor, using your history, an in-person exam, blood tests and sometimes imaging. Nothing on the internet substitutes for that.
• A risk profile looks forward — of the factors known to influence long-term brain health, where do you stand, and what could you move? This is the one most people are actually looking for, especially if they're worried but symptom-free.

It's also worth being straight about the limits of risk scores in general. Researchers use validated indices like LIBRA and CAIDE, and they're genuinely useful for orientation — but they only modestly predict individual outcomes, and none clearly outperform age and education alone. So treat any risk check, including ours, as an educational map of your modifiable factors, not a forecast. That honesty is the point: a map you can act on beats a number you can't.

The 14 factors — and the ones you can actually move

The Lancet Commission's 2024 update raised its list from 12 factors to 14, adding high LDL cholesterol and untreated vision loss. Together they're associated with about 45% of cases at a population level. Here's the whole map, grouped the way it's easiest to act on — each links to a deeper guide.

Your heart numbers

What's good for your blood vessels is good for your brain — this cluster carries some of the strongest evidence of all.

• Blood pressure — the single strongest causal signal; large trials link lowering high blood pressure to fewer dementia cases.
• Blood sugar and type 2 diabetes — long-term glucose control tracks with lower risk.
• LDL cholesterol — newly added in 2024; a midlife number worth knowing.

How you move and eat

• Physical activity — the most consistently protective behaviour in the whole field.
• The MIND diet — a brain-healthy eating pattern (and an honest look at what the trials found).
• Supplements — mostly hype; here's what the evidence really shows.
• Alcohol — less is lower-risk, and the "red wine helps" idea hasn't held up. Smoking belongs here too: stopping helps at any age.

Your senses

• Hearing loss — the largest single modifiable factor, and one of the most treatable.
• Vision loss — the other factor added in 2024; often fixable with glasses or cataract surgery.

Sleep, mood and connection

• Sleep — deep sleep does housekeeping your brain depends on.
• Social isolation and loneliness — connection is a real, modifiable lever.
• Depression is on the list too, and it's treatable — worth raising with your doctor rather than riding out.

Keeping your mind stretched

• Processing-speed training — the one type of brain training with long-term evidence behind it.
• Brain games and crosswords — enjoyable, but not the shield the ads suggest.

And the parts you can't change

Age is the biggest risk factor of all, and your genes matter — family history is real, but it's rarely destiny, and it's precisely why the modifiable factors are worth your attention. Less education early in life, head injury and air pollution round out the 14; the first two are largely historical for most adults, and air pollution is more environmental than personal. For the full breakdown, see the 14 modifiable risk factors.

One more worth knowing: some memory problems have causes that are simply reversible — like low vitamin B12, thyroid problems, medication side effects or poor sleep. A doctor can check for these, which is another reason not to jump to conclusions.

Why "where do I stand" beats generic advice

"Sleep well, exercise, eat vegetables" is true and almost useless. Everyone has heard it, and nobody knows which lever matters most for them. You might already be doing brilliantly on movement and diet while your untreated hearing and your blood pressure — two of the heaviest factors on the list — go unchecked for a decade. Generic advice can't tell you that. A profile can.

That's the whole idea: swap a vague, background dread for a short list of two or three things that are actually yours to move. And because the biological changes behind common dementias can begin up to two decades before any symptoms, midlife isn't too early to look — it's the best window you'll get. For the honest answer on whether any of this works, see can you actually reduce your risk of Alzheimer's?

What to do with your result

However your profile comes out, the constructive next steps are the same:

• Pick two or three, not fourteen. Trying to fix everything at once is how people quit in a fortnight. Start with the heaviest factors that are actually open to you.
• Get the numbers you don't have. If you don't know your blood pressure, your HbA1c or your LDL — or you've never had a hearing or eye test — those are appointments, not mysteries. Ask your doctor.
• Play the long game. These factors work over years, not weeks. Consistency is the whole mechanism; a perfect month followed by nothing does very little.
• Re-check as things change. Your profile isn't fixed. Treat hearing loss, get your blood pressure down, and your map genuinely changes.

And if you're noticing memory or thinking changes that are new, getting worse, and interfering with daily life — that's a different situation from risk, and it deserves a doctor's appointment rather than a self-check.

How we research and review our content →

This article is educational and is not medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Studies and indices cited — including the Lancet Commission, LIBRA and CAIDE — describe risk factors in general, not Solenna specifically. A risk profile is not a diagnosis, a prediction, or a medical device: validated dementia risk scores only modestly predict individual outcomes. Solenna does not diagnose, prevent, treat, or cure Alzheimer's disease or any form of dementia; individual results vary and no outcome is guaranteed. If you are concerned about your memory or cognitive health, consult a qualified healthcare professional.