Episode
Lower Risk of Dementia with AS01-Adjuvanted Vaccination Against Shingles and Respiratory Syncytial Virus Infections
- Podcast
- Neurology Minute
- Published
- May 26, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 218
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Summary
Dr. Margarita Fedorova discusses whether a vaccine ingredient is quietly protecting the brain. Show citation: Taquet M, Todd JA, Harrison PJ. Lower risk of dementia with AS01-adjuvanted vaccination against shingles and respiratory syncytial virus infections. NPJ Vaccines . 2025;10(1):130. Published 2025 Jun 25. doi: 10.1038/s41541-025-01172-3 Show transcript: Dr. Margarita Fedorova: Welcome to Neurology Minute. My name is Margarita Fedorova, and I'm a neurology resident at the Cleveland Clinic. Today we're exploring a study that raises a compelling question. Could a vaccine ingredient be quietly protecting the brain? A recent study by Taquet et al., published in npj Vaccines in 2025, investigated whether vaccination with an AS01-adjuvanted vaccine is associated with a lower risk of dementia. You might know it as the immune-boosting ingredient in Shingrix, the shingles vaccine, and Arexvy, the new RSV vaccine. We already know from prior work that the Shingrix vaccine was associated with a reduced risk of dementia, but the question this paper asks is why. Is it because preventing shingles itself protects the brain, or is there something specific about the adjuvant that's doing the work? To answer this, the researchers used a large US electronic health record database comparing over 35,000 people who received the AS01-adjuvanted RSV vaccine, over 100,000 who received the AS01-adjuvanted shingles vaccine and over 78,000 who received both. Each matched against individuals who got the seasonal flu vaccine instead. The findings were interesting. People who received the RSV vaccine had a 29% lower risk of new dementia diagnosis over the following 18 months. Those who received the shingles vaccine had an 18% increase in time without dementia, and those who received both had a 3…