Early socio-economic challenges can hamper brain development and maturation, leading to Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRDs) later in life. Hispanics experience widespread socio-economic adversity and are known to be at high risk for developing ADRDS.

The National Institute on Aging has awarded Carmen R. Isasi, M.D., Ph.D., a four-year, $1.9 million grant to understand how poverty and other early and sustained adverse socio-economic conditions influence the risk for developing ADRDs in a cohort of Hispanic and Latino adults. The research will involve participants in the Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos and its neurocognitive MRI neuroimaging studies. Dr. Isasi and her colleagues will collect socio-cultural data, measures of cognitive decline and brain injury, and other information to identify the most influential factors responsible for ADRDs risk in Hispanics and Latinos.

Dr. Isasi is associate professor of epidemiology & population health and of pediatrics at Einstein. (1RF1AG077639-01)