By Elizabeth Kocsis
Farming is a demanding, fulfilling, and essential job. It can also be dangerous! The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA, 2025) indicates that 200,000 work-related injuries occur on U.S. farms annually. Farm family members, including children, account for 65 percent of those injuries.
Many types of injuries can occur on a farm. Farmers and farming families can suffer injuries from falls, animal handling, operating machinery, falling objects, slick surfaces, sharp objects, and other risks. With all these hazards, injury to the head can occur. Head injuries can put people, including farming families, at risk for developing Alzheimer's disease and dementia later in life.
What Is Dementia?
According to the Alzheimer's Association (2025b), dementia is a general term for "loss of memory, language, problem-solving, and other thinking abilities that are severe enough to interfere with daily life." Alzheimer's is the most common cause of dementia. Over 7 million Americans are living with Alzheimer's. By 2050, it is projected that nearly 13 million Americans will be living with Alzheimer's disease.
Not only does Alzheimer's disease and dementia affect those who suffer from it, but it also affects family members who often provide care. The Alzheimer's Association (2025a) indicates that in 2024, almost 12 million families and other caregivers of people living with Alzheimer's or other dementias provided an estimated 19 billion hours of unpaid help. A recent Penn State study found that while the role of caregiver is valued and enjoyed, caregivers were still often stressed by the emotional and financial cost of caring for their loved ones (Pojman et al., 2024).
What Are the Risk Factors?
The Alzheimer's Association (2025b) lists several risk factors for developing Alzheimer's and dementia, including age, family history, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes. One area that researchers are particularly interested in is head trauma. According to the Brain Injury Association of America (2022), a range of studies show that moderate to severe head injury increases the risk of Alzheimer's disease. If someone has a moderate head injury, their risk can more than double, and for severe head injuries, the risk can increase by over four times. The Mayo Clinic (2021) defines moderate or severe head injury as a loss of consciousness longer than several minutes with physical and cognitive symptoms such as worsening headache, nausea, inability to wake up, confusion, and slurred speech. The Brain Injury Association of America's website also states that those with multiple traumatic brain injuries and those who suffer brain injury after age 55 are at an increased risk of developing Alzheimer's.
Location matters, too. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC, 2024), people living in rural areas, including children, have a greater risk of dying from a traumatic brain injury compared to people living in urban areas. This risk is due to factors such as longer travel times to receive care, limited access to trauma centers, or delays in receiving care.
Source : psu.edu