Anesthesia and incident dementia: a population-based, nested, case-control study.

OBJECTIVE: To test the hypothesis that exposure to procedures requiring general anesthesia during adulthood is not significantly associated with incident dementia using a retrospective, population-based, nested, case-control study design.

PARTICIPANTS AND METHODS: Using the Rochester Epidemiology Project and the Mayo Clinic Alzheimer's Disease Patient Registry, residents of Olmsted County, Minnesota, diagnosed as having dementia between January 1, 1985, and December 31, 1994, were identified. For each incident case, a sex- and age-matched control was randomly selected from the general pool of Olmsted County residents who were dementia free in the index year of dementia diagnosis. Medical records were reviewed to determine exposures to procedures requiring anesthesia after age 45 years and before the index year. Data were analyzed using logistic regression.

RESULTS: We analyzed 877 cases of dementia, each with a corresponding control. Of the dementia cases, 615 (70%) underwent 1681 procedures requiring general anesthesia; of the controls, 636 (73%) underwent 1638 procedures. When assessed as a dichotomous variable, anesthetic exposure was not significantly associated with dementia (odds ratio, 0.89; 95% CI, 0.73-1.10; P=.27). In addition, no significant association was found when exposure was quantified as number of procedures (odds ratios, 0.87, 0.86, and 1.0 for 1, 2-3, and ≥4 exposures, respectively, compared with none; P=.51).

CONCLUSION: This study found no significant association between exposure to procedures requiring general anesthesia after age 45 years and incident dementia.