MADISON, Wis. — A new University of Wisconsin-Madison study finds that Indigenous people face high health and financial burdens from Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias.

Researchers said it costs $880 million to $1.9 billion annually in additional health care-related costs for dementia diagnoses among Indigenous people.

That cost rises to an additional $1.2 billion to $2.5 billion when including diagnoses of malnutrition or adult failure to thrive — two conditions frequently caused by Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias.

Cases of malnutrition and adult failure to thrive — which can involve weight loss, decreased appetite and poor nutrition, and inactivity — can also show a misdiagnosis of the disease.

“Taken together, this work exemplifies the potential benefits of offering programs to prevent, accurately diagnose and treat Alzheimer’s and related dementias among Indigenous adults,” said Adrienne Johnson, assistant professor of medicine, UW School of Medicine and Public Health, and lead author of the study, in a press release.

But researchers estimate that these costs under-represent the total amount of health care costs from Indigenous people.

That’s because researchers only focused on data from one subset of the American Indian/Alaska Native adult population — those ages 65 or older.

However, adults younger than that age can develop dementia.

Data was also used from the 2020 census, a year when American Indian/Alaska Native people were under-counted.

Therefore, researchers say, the economic impact is likely to exceed the numbers in the study.

“Programs to prevent, diagnose and treat Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias should be created with the input and collaboration of tribal leaders, who already recognize that the need for dementia-related prevention and care services is growing for many tribal communities,” said Carey Gleason, associate professor of medicine and senior author of the study.

In the study, researchers analyzed Wisconsin Department of Health Services health care utilization cost data from 2015 to 2020.

To calculate the costs, researchers used this data and data on prevalence rates of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias in the 65 or older American Indian/Alaska Native population.