SummaryDementia, with dementia due to Alzheimer’s disease as the most prevalent form, is one of the most frequent diseases in our aging society with still no effective treatment to date despite promising advantages in anti-amyloid therapies. Therefore, research on prevention is still a major focus in the field . One lifestyle factor that has received much attention as a possible target for maintaining brain health and cognitive function into old age is healthy sleep habits. Research has shown that as we age, sleep behavior changes and there is strong evidence for a link of sleep habits with cognitive performance and the development of dementia. However, previous studies investigating the association of sleep, cognitive function and risk of dementia provide inconsistent findings so far and often only shed light on one aspect of sleep. Therefore, the present study aims to provide a comprehensive assessment on the association of subjectively as well as objectively assessed macrostructural sleep patterns, as determined by information from interview and SOMNOwatch assessment, and cognitive function as well as brain structure as a surrogate marker of brain health. This assessment will include grey and white matter changes, thus spanning the range from neurodegenerative to vascular pathologies.

Keywords MRI Somnowatch brain-health cognition dementia sleep structural-brain-measures white-matter-hyperintensities

InstitutionsUniversitätsmedizin Greifswald, Klinik für Neurologie, Universitätsmedizin Greifswald, Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg, Institut für Epidemiologie der Universität Münster, Universitätsklinikum Bonn, Martin-Luther-Universität Halle, Forschungszentrum Jülich