Overview

• Taipei Medical University investigators tracked 452,777 overweight and obese adults for 10 years through a global federated health network.
• Metformin users experienced 8–12% lower dementia incidence than matched nonusers across overweight, obesity and severe obesity categories.
• All-cause death rates were 26–28% lower among metformin users compared to nonusers over the decade-long study period.
• The analysis appears in Diabetes, Obesity and Metabolism and represents one of the largest observational assessments of a diabetes drug’s impact on cognitive health.
• Researchers stress the need for randomized controlled trials to clarify the biological pathways behind metformin’s neuroprotective and survival benefits.