ArticleBMC medicine2026
Dementia risk by metabolic health and obesity in two prospective cohorts.
Article in BMC medicine, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundMidlife obesity is a well-established risk factor for dementia, whereas late-life obesity has been associated with no increased risk, or even a reduced risk in some studies. However, the joint associations of obesity (body mass index ≥ 30 kg/m
methodsWe analysed data from 11,482 participants, aged 51 to 100 years, from the US Health and Retirement Study (HRS), and 13,068 participants, aged 45 to 90 years, from the Swedish Twin Registry (STR). Cox regression models were used to estimate dementia risk in relation to metabolically healthy obesity (MHO), metabolically unhealthy obesity (MUO), and metabolically unhealthy no obesity (MUNO), relative to metabolically healthy no obesity (reference). Models were adjusted for age, sex, smoking status, and education level. Analyses were stratified by midlife and late-life and conducted in the entire sample and separately by sex.
resultsMetabolically unhealthy status in midlife and late-life indicated increased dementia risk regardless of obesity status, reaching statistical significance for midlife MUNO in females in HRS (Hazard ratio (HR): 1.62, 95% confidence intervals (CI): 1.05-2.49) and in late-life MUNO for the full sample in STR (HR: 1.13, CI: 1.02-1.25) and males in the STR (HR: 1.22, CI: 1.04-1.42). The associations between MUO and dementia risk were not statistically significant, but trends suggested midlife MUO was associated with higher dementia risk. The associations between mid and late-life MHO with dementia risk were also not statistically significant, although the associations showed trends towards lower dementia risk.
conclusionsBeing metabolically unhealthy, especially in midlife, may be associated with increased dementia risk, regardless of obesity status. Mid- and late-life MHO showed no increased risk and suggested potential inverse associations. These findings underscore the importance of evaluating dementia risk in the context of obesity, metabolic health, age and sex simultaneously.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.