A history of depression may confer an increased risk for later developing AD. 3 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
Research
27,780 Alzheimer's and dementia studies in plain English, each scored out of 100.
Recent studies have used non-invasive brain stimulation (NIBS) techniques, such as repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) and transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), to increase dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) activity and, consequently, working memory (WM) performance. 5 key findings →
Design: systematic review Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
We also identified several common challenges. 2 key findings →
Design: systematic review Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
We reviewed epidemiological and experimental studies of female gonadal hormone replacement therapy (HRT) on cognitive function in post-menopausal women and carried out meta-analyses. 1 key finding →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
Meta-analysis was used to examine pooled parameter estimates of 9 active compared with 6 control conditions of the Resources for Enhancing Alzheimer's Caregiver Health (REACH) project at 6 months on caregiver burden and depressive symptoms. 4 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
Current pharmacological therapy for Alzheimer's disease (AD) includes the cholinesterase inhibitors (ChEIs) donepezil, rivastigmine, and galantamine and the N-methyl D-aspartate receptor antagonist memantine. 3 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
We identified several subgroups of the population who are particularly susceptible to temperature extremes, including persons with atrial fibrillation. 5 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
If these results can be generalised then virtually all mental disorders have an increased risk of suicide excepting mental retardation and dementia. 2 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is one of the leading causes of injury-related death. 2 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
To evaluate the clinical importance of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) phosphorylated tau 181 (p-tau181) in mild cognitive impairment (MCI), Alzheimer's disease (AD) and other dementias, more specifically: frontotemporal degeneration (FTD), dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), vascular dementia (VaD) and Parkinson's disease (PD) with dementia (PDD). 2 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source
Studies evaluating the diagnostic test accuracy of plasma phosphorylated tau (p-tau) and amyloid beta (Aβ) tests (p-tau217, %p-tau217, p-tau181, p-tau231, and Aβ42/Aβ40) compared to reference standard tests (cerebrospinal fluid [CSF] AD biomarkers, amyloid positron emission tomography [PET], or neuropathology) in individuals with cognitive impairment (mild cognitive impairment or dementia) in specialized care settings were included. 4 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: moderate
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
The present findings provide evidence of the benefits of NIBS, especially tDCS, for beneficial effect on cognition in patients with AD. 3 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Participants: 12 Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
Nutrition is an important modifiable risk factor that plays a role in the strategy to prevent or delay the onset of dementia. 2 key findings →
Design: systematic review Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
Subjective Cognitive Decline (SCD) in older adults has been identified as a risk factor for dementia, although the literature is inconsistent, and it is unclear which factors moderate progression from SCD to dementia. 1 key finding →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Full text may need a subscription
The past and ongoing increase in midlife obesity prevalence will contribute significantly to the future prevalence of dementia and public health measures to reduce midlife obesity are simultaneously primary prevention measures to reduce the risk of dementia. 2 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
In the present meta-analysis, we integrated findings from 228 studies on the association of six caregiving-related stressors and caregiving uplifts with burden and depressed mood. 1 key finding →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Full text may need a subscription
We found 32 studies with burden models and 24 depression and mental health models. 2 key findings →
Design: systematic review Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Full text may need a subscription
There is evidence of geographical variation in rates of dementia in affluent countries at a variety of geographical scales. 2 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
Early diagnosis of cognitive disorders in older adults is a major healthcare priority with benefits to patients, families, and health systems. 1 key finding →
Design: systematic review Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
Strikingly gene-expression, network-based analysis and cell type deconvolution approaches revealed a consistent immune signature in the brain and blood of female AD patients that was absent in males. 5 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
Supervised intervention delivery is linked to greatest benefits. 2 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
Despite improvements in diagnostic criteria for dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), the ability to discriminate DLB from Alzheimer's disease (AD) and other dementias remains suboptimal. 5 key findings →
Design: systematic review Participants: 43 Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is often considered an early stage of dementia, with estimated rates of progression to dementia up to 80-90% after approximately 6 years from the initial diagnosis. 2 key findings →
Design: systematic review Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
There is sufficient evidence to take seriously the possibility that depression is a risk factor for dementia and cognitive decline. 2 key findings →
Design: meta-analysis Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Full text may need a subscription
Affective disorders appear to be associated with an increased risk of developing dementia, and one that is dependent on clinical and demographic variables. 4 key findings →
Design: systematic review Evidence: high
Full summary, score breakdown and related studies → Original source Free full text
Where “Free full text” comes from
Free full text links and the Full text may need a subscription label come from Unpaywall, Europe PMC and OpenAlex records of free copies, checked 10 Oct 2026. A study with neither is unknown, not paywalled. Show only studies that are free to read
How the 0–100 score works — and why some entries are capped
This is alzhub's own score. It is not an official metric, not an impact factor, and no journal, publisher or ranking body endorses it. We built it so that a reader who is not a scientist can tell a landmark trial from a conference abstract without having to already know the difference. Every point comes from one of 20 components, all of them printed on the study itself, so you can disagree with our arithmetic rather than having to trust the total.
- Journal tier up to 10 pts
- Journal's citation record up to 4 pts
- Study design up to 12 pts
- Strength of evidence up to 5 pts
- Peer-review validation up to 10 pts
- How recent up to 5 pts
- Sample size up to 4 pts
- Effect reported up to 3 pts
- Studied in people up to 3 pts
- Randomised / blinded up to 2 pts
- Times cited up to 7 pts
- Citations per year up to 5 pts
- Impact for its field and year up to 6 pts
- Cited by studies here up to 6 pts
- Still being cited up to 4 pts
- Senior author's track record up to 4 pts
- Institution's track record up to 3 pts
- Multi-centre collaboration up to 3 pts
- Indexed in PubMed up to 2 pts
- Free to read up to 2 pts
Journals are placed in ordered tiers, never given a numeric impact factor — we could not verify current impact factors from a source we control, and an invented one would be worse than none. Tier 1 is the top-tier general journals (NEJM, The Lancet, JAMA, Nature, Science, Nature Medicine); tier 2 is the leading specialty journals; tier 3 is every other peer-reviewed journal. A separate part scores how much the journal's own papers are cited, which tells the tier-3 journals apart.
Two rules we don't bend. First, we never fill in a missing value: if a record does not state a sample size or a design, that component scores zero, and if we simply have no data for a part, such as a citation count, that part is left out and the study is scored on the parts we could check. The study card says which. Second, anything that is not a peer-reviewed article is capped at 16/100 and carries a warning chip — so a conference abstract or a company press release can never outrank a peer-reviewed paper, no matter how good it looks.
We rank a rigorous null result — a good trial showing that something does not work — above an early positive finding. Someone deciding whether to buy a supplement is served by that, and the rigour is already counted by the design and journal components.
The score is computed from the published data alone and is reproducible: the same file always yields the same numbers.
See the whole rubric drawn out → — four charts covering all 27,780 studies: how the scores are spread and where the cap bites, which of the 20 components the library is strong and weak on, which subjects rest on stronger evidence, and what kinds of study each subject is actually built from.
What this library is — and isn't
This is a large sample of the Alzheimer's literature, not an exhaustive index of it. It holds 27,780 records, built mostly from automated pulls of Europe PMC (61.1% of the library) and OpenAlex (18.3%), plus smaller pulls from PubMed, Crossref and medRxiv. If a study, a drug, or a finding isn't here, that is not evidence it doesn't exist in the literature — it may simply not have been pulled in yet.
1,034 records (3.7% of the library) are not peer-reviewed — 962 of those are preprints posted before any journal review, and the rest are conference abstracts, regulatory notices and reports. Every study card on this page states its status plainly, and the score above is capped for anything that isn't a peer-reviewed article.
See the full, machine-readable breakdown of this library's coverage →