A colleague of mine had the exact opposite finding. |
The major way we've reduced the death rate from heart disease is through lifestyle changes: eating better, exercising more, smoking less. It would require a lot of people to change the way they live, but there's no reason to think we can't have the same impact on Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia. |
The most likely explanation is that there is something about these individuals or about this disease that affects body mass index (BMI) before the clinical syndrome becomes apparent -- that loss of BMI reflects the disease process itself. |