Alzheimer’s disease in Brazil: the influence of sex on the mortality profile

Abstract

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the most common cause of dementia in the elderly, and a leading cause of mortality in developed countries. It is essential that healthcare professionals know in more detail the mortality profile of this dementia so that they can offer a better quality of life to patients. The general objective of this study was to evaluate the AD mortality profile in Brazil, from 2010 to 2019, and the influence of sex and gender on this profile. This study is descriptive in nature with a quantitative approach, using secondary data, and during the presentation of this data, information reproduced by scientific articles on the topic will also be presented. The data were collected from the Mortality Information System (SIM), created by the Information Technology Department of the Unified Health System (DATASUS). The bibliographic survey was carried out in the Scielo and Pubmed databases. We conclude that females present more accelerated cognitive decline compared to males, and there is also a genotypic issue involved. In this way, we can affirm that sex and gender influence the clinical progression of AD, providing opportunities for measures to be taken early regarding these data, such as public health policies to combat AD.