Diversity & Dementia: how is research bridging the gap?

This webinar was livestreamed by the UK Dementia Research Institute (UKDRI) on the 20th October and chaired by Dr Adrian Ivinson. It features short talks from Dr Frances Wiseman, Professor Tara Spires-Jones, Professor John Hardy and Dr Mie Rizig. The talks are followed by a live 20-minute Q&A where questions from the audience, submitted during the event, will be answered by the researchers.

Why is it important to consider diversity in science? Two thirds of people living with dementia are women, and yet historically women have been underrepresented in research. People who have Down syndrome have an extremely high chance of developing dementia in their lifetime, but they are typically excluded from clinical trials.

Health inequalities are unfair, systematic differences in health between different groups of people. These differences affect people living with dementia in a multitude of ways, and the reasons behind them are complex – as detailed in our new report, ‘Diversity and dementia: how is research reducing health disparities?’. But there are steps we can take to mitigate these inequalities, and scientific research has a key part to play. So what are our scientists doing to try and address these issues in their own research?

In the webinar, speakers tackle these questions and more, shining a light on the underrepresented groups affected by dementia, advocating for the use of female mice in animal research, and aiming to understand how genetic risk of dementia varies by ethnicity.

For more information on the UKDRI visit: https://ukdri.ac.uk/

Meet some of the UKDRI Researchers.