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Indian origin professor receives funding to develop epidemiology of dementia
The research will focus on studying novel risk and resilience factors
Sachdev is addressing global disparities in dementia research and advancing international efforts to combat its impact / Image - UNSW
The Cohort Studies of Memory in an International Consortium (COSMIC), spearheaded by the Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA) at the University of New South Wales (UNSW), has secured a grant of $US7.3 million over five years from the National Institutes of Health in the United States.
CHeBA, under the leadership of Indian-origin professor Perminder Sachdev, is at the forefront of dementia epidemiology, addressing global disparities in dementia research and advancing international efforts to combat the impact of dementia.
Often described as the next pandemic already underway, Dementia affects 50 million families globally, with an estimated cost to the global economy reaching $1.3 trillion in 2020.
“CHeBA is perfectly positioned to achieve major goals set by the World Health Assembly’s Global Action Plan on the public health response to dementia, including evidence-based practice for dementia risk reduction, early and appropriate diagnosis, and global equity in research,” Sachdev said.
“This funding will allow us to harness the power of our unique consortium, to map globally the 12 modifiable risk factors of dementia identified by the 2020 Lancet Commission, document the diverse epidemiology of dementia internationally, and better understand ethnic differences in the genetics and biomarkers for dementia,” he added.
The U.S. National Institute on Aging has announced a grant to the CHeBA, enabling the expansion of its international research collaboration within COSMIC.
The research will focus on studying novel risk and resilience factors, including the built and economic environments, air pollution, sleep, nutrition, and social health. Social factors such as activity levels, network size, quality of engagement, loneliness, and frailty will also be explored.
Over the next five years, the CHeBA will document the incidence of mild cognitive impairment and dementia in diverse regions through the COSMIC initiative. The research will focus on developing risk models for dementia in specific populations, mapping risk and protective factors, and estimating their global burden.
The emphasis will be on under-represented populations to create population-specific risk indices, contributing to the global campaign to prevent dementia.
Sachdev is a Scientia professor of Neuropsychiatry at UNSW Sydney and clinical director of the Neuropsychiatric Institute at Prince of Wales Hospital in Sydney, Australia. After graduating from the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi, he completed his MD in Psychiatry before moving to New Zealand.
Following his relocation to Australia, he completed his psychiatric training and PhD, subsequently becoming the head of the Neuropsychiatric Institute.
In 2012, Sachdev co-founded the CHeBA at UNSW Sydney, dedicated to promoting brain health and preventing dementia. He plays a key role in leading three longitudinal cognitive aging studies; the Sydney Memory and Ageing Study, the Older Australian Twins Study, and the Sydney Centenarian Study.
Additionally, he leads three international networks; COSMIC, the Stroke and Cognition Consortium (STROKOG), and the International Centenarian Consortium on Dementia (ICC-Dementia).
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