Dementias and gender differences

On 8 and 9 October Padua hosts the national conference Dementia and gender differences. Clinical, biological and socio-cultural approaches, promoted by the Centro studi su Salute e Medicina di genere and by the Department of Neuroscience of the University of Padua.

In Veneto, 69,917 people with dementia are recorded by health services, while at least 95 thousand show cognitive decline. 68% are women, with an incidence twice that of men; there are more than 2,000 cases of early onset. In Italy, the overall cost of dementia exceeds 23 billion euros a year, with a major impact also on families and caregivers.

“Sex and gender are relevant factors in the diagnosis and treatment of cognitive decline: Alzheimer’s is more frequent in women and shows clinical and biological differences compared with men,” underlines Giovannella Baggio, president of the Centro studi Salute e Medicina di genere. On the same topic, Maurizio Corbetta, director of the Neurology Clinic, and Annachiara Cagnin, lecturer in the Department of Neuroscience, members of the scientific committee, draw attention to the new diagnostic and therapeutic perspectives and to possible gender differences in diagnostic accuracy and treatment effectiveness.

The aim of the meeting is to promote an increasingly personalised approach to the diagnosis and care of dementia.