Changing patterns in the prevalence of dementia in a Japanese community: the Hisayama study.

We compared type-specific prevalences of dementia between two surveys of Hisayama residents > or = 65 years old conducted in 1985 and 1992. The overall age-adjusted prevalence was greatly decreased from 5.4% in 1985 to 3.3% in 1992 for men, while it was changed little from 7.5 to 6.3% for women. The prevalence of vascular dementia (VD) decreased during the intervening 7 years in men but not in women. The prevalence of Alzheimer's type (SDAT) was the same in either sex. The ratio of VD to SDAT prevalence was 1.8 in 1985 but fell to 1.1 in 1992. The background factors responsible for this change are discussed.