Cognitive footprint: a framework to guide public policy

This chapter elaborates our proposed ‘cognitive footprint’ framework, which captures the cognitive effects of experiences, events and interventions across the life course. Our aim is to highlight the importance of considering cognitive damage (and enhancement) occurring earlier in life and in non-health domains, in light of the growing burden of late-life dementia. We illustrate the usefulness of this framework across a diverse range of examples, namely medication use, loneliness, pollution, perinatal mental illness and traumatic brain injury. We also discuss how this framework fits within current economic evaluation practices to guide public policy and the potential challenges involved.