Muscle weakness and frailty are common among older adults living with dementia, especially those in nursing homes. A new study suggests that combining daily strength exercises with protein-rich nutritional drinks may help some residents maintain greater physical independence.
Researchers at Karolinska Institutet studied 102 older adults across eight nursing homes in the Stockholm area. For 12 weeks, participants in the intervention group performed standing exercises several times per day and consumed one to two protein-enriched nutritional drinks daily. A control group continued usual care.
The findings, published in Alzheimer’s & Dementia, build on earlier results from the OPEN study showing improvements in muscle mass and physical function. In this secondary analysis, researchers examined whether those physical gains translated into changes in the amount of assistance residents required for daily tasks such as dressing, hygiene and mobility.
When all residents were analyzed together, there were no clear overall differences between groups. However, among residents living in dementia wards, those who participated in the program showed improved functional ability compared with controls.
“One possible explanation is that people in dementia units had better physical conditions for improving their functional ability and were therefore able to do more things themselves after the intervention,” said Anders Wimo, a researcher at the Department of Neurobiology, Care Sciences and Society at Karolinska Institutet.
The researchers emphasize that these results should be interpreted cautiously. The analysis examining care needs was conducted retrospectively and was not the primary outcome of the original trial.
“More studies are needed where care time is a primary outcome and where organizational factors, such as staffing levels and work routines, are closely monitored,” Wimo said.
The study cannot determine whether the benefits were driven primarily by exercise, increased protein intake or the combination of both. Still, the findings reinforce existing evidence that muscle maintenance plays an important role in healthy aging, including among people living with dementia.
The study was funded by the Gamla Tjänarinnor Foundation and Danone Nutricia Research, which provided the nutritional drinks but did not participate in data collection or final analyses. The researchers report no competing interests other than that one author holds the copyright to the measuring instrument used.