Spouses May Increase Risk Of Dementia By Up To 70%, New Study Finds

New research suggests that having a spouse with dementia may raise your own risk of cognitive decline. Marriage has been linked to many good things in life, including lower heart attack risk and less obesity. But when it comes to dementia, the picture gets complicated.

Notably, dementia is not a disease, it is an umbrella term for a collection of symptoms like memory loss, confusion, and impaired thinking. It is a clinical syndrome caused by underlying brain damage from conditions like Alzheimer's disease, stroke, with symptoms interfering with daily life.

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A recent analysis, conducted between July 15, 2025, and May 15, 2026, on nearly one million married people in Taiwan, reports that people married to someone with dementia have a significantly higher chance of developing dementia themselves. The increase was up to 74% in women and 69% in men, compared with married couples where neither partner had dementia.

Researchers noted that previous studies suggest that spouses of individuals with dementia may be at increased risk of developing dementia. However, there's limited evidence.

The study is based on a nationwide population and used Taiwan's National Health Insurance Research Database from 1998 to 2022, with follow-up through 2022.

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"To address prior limitations of small sample size and limited subgroup evaluation, spouses of individuals with incident dementia were identified and matched 1 to 4 to unexposed controls by birth year, sex, income, and urbanicity," the authors confirmed.

Emphasising why this happens, the authors noted that the association was evident on relative and absolute scales and varied by family and socioeconomic context.

"Future studies should directly measure caregiving intensity, education, lifestyle factors, and other shared or postexposure pathways," they stated.