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Receiving six or extra prescriptions of the drug gabapentin for low again ache is related to considerably elevated dangers of growing dementia and delicate cognitive impairment (MCI)—29% and 85%, respectively—finds a big medical information research printed on-line within the journal Regional Anesthesia & Ache Medication.
What’s extra, these dangers have been greater than twice as excessive in these usually thought of too younger to develop both situation—18–64-year-olds—the findings point out.
In contrast to opioids, gabapentin has comparatively low addictive potential, and it has grow to be more and more widespread for the therapy of power ache, particularly neuropathic ache, because it provides probably neuroprotective advantages, level out the researchers.
However considerations are starting to emerge about its negative effects, together with a attainable affiliation with neurodegeneration, though the findings so far have been blended, together with whether or not explicit age teams could be extra susceptible, they add.
In a bid to shed extra gentle on these points, the researchers drew on real-time information from TriNetX, a federated well being analysis community, which accommodates digital well being information from 68 well being care organizations throughout the U.S.
They scrutinized the anonymized information of grownup sufferers who had and hadn’t been prescribed gabapentin (26,414 in every group) for power low ache between 2004 and 2024, taking account of demographics, co-existing situations, and the usage of different analgesic medicine.
Those that had obtained six or extra gabapentin prescriptions have been 29% extra prone to be recognized with dementia and 85% extra prone to be recognized with MCI inside 10 years of their preliminary ache prognosis.
And when the information have been stratified by age, 18–64-year-olds prescribed the drug have been greater than twice as prone to develop both situation than those that hadn’t been prescribed gabapentin.
Whereas there was no heightened danger amongst 18–34-year-olds prescribed the drug, the dangers of dementia greater than doubled and people of MCI greater than tripled amongst 35–49-year-olds prescribed it. An identical sample was noticed amongst 50–64-year-olds.
Dangers additionally rose in tandem with prescription frequency: sufferers with 12 or extra prescriptions have been 40% extra prone to develop dementia and 65% extra prone to develop MCI than these prescribed gabapentin between three and 11 occasions.
That is an observational research, and as such, no agency conclusions may be drawn about trigger and impact. The researchers additionally acknowledge that their research was retrospective, and so they weren’t in a position to account for dose or size of gabapentin use.
However, they conclude, “Our findings indicate an association between gabapentin prescription and dementia or cognitive impairment within 10 years. Moreover, increased gabapentin prescription frequency correlated with dementia incidence.”
They add, “Our results support the need for close monitoring of adult patients prescribed gabapentin to assess for potential cognitive decline.”
Extra data:
Threat of dementia following gabapentin prescription in power low again ache sufferers, Regional Anesthesia & Ache Medication (2025). DOI: 10.1136/rapm-2025-106577
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British Medical Journal
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Nerve ache drug gabapentin linked to elevated dementia, cognitive impairment dangers (2025, July 10)
retrieved 10 July 2025
from https://medicalxpress.com/information/2025-07-nerve-pain-drug-gabapentin-linked.html
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