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In one study, Harvard and University of Massachusetts researchers recruited 787 adults who had recently quit smoking. At the outset, the participants were asked what, if any, aids they had used to help them kick the habit, including nicotine replacement therapy (such as patches, gum and inhalers), got advice from a doctor, or joined a smoking-cessation program. The researchers then followed the subjects over a period of five years to see who resumed smoking.

The findings, published in the journal Tobacco Control, revealed that one-third of those who quit eventually succumbed to their old vice. What’s more, there was no significant difference in the relapse rate among people who used nicotine replacement therapies (NRT) and those who didn’t.

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Higher plasma adiponectin levels may be an independent risk factor for all-cause dementia and Alzheimer’s disease in women, according to data recently published in the Archives of Neurology.

“It is well established that insulin signaling is dysfunctional in the brains of patients with Alzheimer’s disease, and since adiponectin enhances insulin sensitivity, one would also expect beneficial actions protecting against cognitive decline,” the researchers wrote. “Our data, however, indicate that elevated adiponectin level was associated with an increased risk of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease in women.”

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Tiny areas of dead tissue located within the brain might be the cause of some instances of memory loss in older adults, a new study scheduled for publication this week has suggested.

According to Alan Mozes of USA Today HealthDay, the study — which was funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and will be published in the January 3 edition of the journal Neurology — looked at 658 men and women at least 65 years of age.

None of the study participants had a history of dementia, and all of them underwent MRI brain scans and various memory, linguistic skill, visual perception and related tests, Mozes said. The researchers discovered that 174 subjects had experienced silent strokes, and that those individuals did not perform as well on the memory exams as the other study participants.

“Given that conditions like Alzheimer’s disease are defined mainly by memory problems, our results may lead to further insight into what causes symptoms and the development of new interventions for prevention,” study co-author Adam M. Brickman, an assistant neurology professor with the Columbia University Medical Center, said in a statement, according to Jeannine Stein of the Los Angeles Times.

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