Hormone therapy linked to lower Alzheimer’s risk in women

New research suggests that hormone replacement therapy (HRT) may be linked to a reduced risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia in postmenopausal women.

A large-scale study from the University of East Anglia and the University of Exeter, which tracked over 180,000 women in the UK via the UK Biobank, found that HRT users had a 16 per cent lower risk of developing Alzheimer’s compared to non-users. The most significant reduction—26 per cent—was observed in women who had undergone surgical menopause.

Complementary findings from Stanford Medicine indicate that estrogen-only therapy, typically used by women who have undergone a hysterectomy, is specifically linked to lower risks. Researchers at Stanford utilized post-mortem brain tissue analysis to identify characteristic Alzheimer’s markers, such as amyloid plaques and tau tangles, to support their findings.

Experts note that women represent nearly two-thirds of Alzheimer’s cases globally. The research highlights how sex-specific factors, including menopause and estrogen exposure, influence brain metabolism and dementia risk.