A new study from Duke University is the first to examine the long-term consequences of heavy smoking on Alzheimer's and vascular dementia.
Over a 14-year period, researchers evaluated the records of 21,000 people. Those who had smoked two packs of cigarettes a day increased their risk of developing Alzheimer's by more than 157 percent. They also had a 172 percent higher risk of developing vascular dementia, the second most common form of dementia after Alzheimer's.
The research is published in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
