What is young onset dementia?

When dementia affects a person under the age of 65, the medical profession refers to it as ‘early or young onset dementia’.  

Young onset dementia affects adults between before the age of 65. According to research published in 2022, it is estimated that there are over 70,800 people in the UK living with young onset dementia. They represent around 5% of the 944,000 people with dementia. This figure could be higher because of the difficulties of diagnosing the condition.