Alcohol use disorder links to higher dementia risk in women
Women with alcohol use disorder had a hazard ratio of 3.73 for all-cause dementia compared to controls, rising to 10.68 before age 70.
medRxiv
In a prospective cohort of 1,288,359 UK women recruited aged 50 to 64 years, researchers followed participants for more than 20 years through linked health records. They matched 20,070 women who had hospital-recorded alcohol use disorder with 100,339 controls. Over follow-up, dementia developed in 3,774 women with alcohol use disorder and 8,239 matched controls.
Hospital-recorded alcohol use disorder was associated with all-cause dementia (hazard ratio 3.73). By subtype, associations were strongest for mixed dementia (hazard ratio 5.03), unspecified dementia (4.29), and vascular dementia (3.96). The risk was substantially higher before age 70 (hazard ratio 10.68) than at ages 70 to 79 (3.75) or age 80 and older (2.34). Elevated dementia risk persisted with a 15-year exposure lag (hazard ratio 2.16) and after accounting for competing mortality.
Why it matters
The findings link clinically recognized alcohol misuse to prolonged neurodegenerative risk and earlier-onset cognitive decline, particularly for vascular and mixed dementia subtypes. This underscores alcohol use disorder as a substantial target for midlife dementia prevention strategies.
Caveats
This work is an observational preprint that has not yet undergone peer review. The analysis was restricted to women and relied on hospital-recorded diagnoses of alcohol use disorder, which may capture only more severe cases.
The paper
University of Oxford
medRxiv · 29 Sep 2026 · Preprint, not peer-reviewed