{
  "abstract": "Introduction\n\nDementia is a common and disabling complication after stroke. Exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation (EXCR) may influence vascular and inflammatory mechanisms relevant to cognitive decline. We investigated the association between EXCR initiation after stroke and incident dementia.Patients and methods\n\nUsing TriNetX, we identified adults with ischaemic stroke or TIA. Patients with recorded ICD-10-CM codes indicating an NIHSS score ≥ 16 were excluded from the primary analysis. Patients initiating EXCR within 6 months were compared with those without documented post-index EXCR. Propensity score matching balanced demographics, comorbidities, medication use and available stroke-severity measures. Outcomes were assessed at 3 and 5 years.Results\n\nThe unmatched cohorts included 4226 patients initiating EXCR (mean age, 64.7 years; 60.8% male) and 1,889,796 without EXCR (mean age, 66.3 years; 48.2% male). After matching, 4138 patients remained in each cohort. At 5 years, EXCR was associated with lower hazards of incident dementia (HR, 0.70; 95% CI, 0.59-0.82), all-cause mortality (HR, 0.50; 95% CI, 0.45-0.55) and recurrent stroke (HR, 0.75; 95% CI, 0.61-0.91), but a higher hazard of rehospitalisation (HR, 1.21; 95% CI, 1.06-1.38); no significant association was observed for acute myocardial infarction. The association with incident dementia remained consistent across sensitivity analyses.Discussion\n\nThe observed association with lower dementia risk suggests that the potential benefits of post-stroke EXCR may extend beyond cardiovascular and functional outcomes.Conclusions\n\nEXCR initiation after ischaemic stroke or TIA was associated with a lower hazard of incident dementia. This association remained consistent across the 3-year, 30-day landmark, 1-year lagged and all-stroke-severity sensitivity analyses.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [
    "Institute of Life Course and Medical Sciences, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, United Kingdom.",
    "Department of Life, Health & Environmental Sciences, University of L'Aquila, L'Aquila, Italy.",
    "Internal Medicine and Nephrology Division, ASL1 Avezzano-Sulmona-L'Aquila, San Salvatore Hospital, L'Aquila, Italy.",
    "Tianjin Key Laboratory of Ionic-Molecular Function of Cardiovascular Disease, Department of Cardiology, Tianjin Institute of Cardiology, The Second Hospital of Tianjin Medical University, Tianjin 300211, China.",
    "Cardiovascular Health Sciences, Research Institute for Sport and Exercise Sciences, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, United Kingdom.",
    "Department of Clinical Medicine, Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark.",
    "Department of Clinical Medicine, Medical University of Bialystok, Bialystok, Poland."
  ],
  "article_type": "research article",
  "arxiv": null,
  "author_total": 9,
  "authors": [
    {
      "affs": [
        0,
        1,
        2
      ],
      "name": "Leandra Serio",
      "orcid": "0009-0008-2568-3721"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "Amir Askarinejad",
      "orcid": "0000-0003-2803-079X"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "Chen Wang"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "Koohyar Ahmadzadeh"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0,
        3
      ],
      "name": "Tianshu Gu"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "Riccardo Proietti",
      "orcid": "0000-0003-4113-7030"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        1,
        2
      ],
      "name": "Claudio Ferri"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0,
        4
      ],
      "name": "Ben Buckley"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0,
        5,
        6
      ],
      "name": "Gregory Y H Lip"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/2h62f4yj6c004.bib",
  "cited_by": 0,
  "doi": "10.1093/esj/aakag127",
  "fulltext_url": "https://europepmc.org/articles/PMC13689881",
  "id": "2h62f4yj6c004",
  "issns": [
    "2396-9873",
    "2396-9881"
  ],
  "landing_url": "https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42911872",
  "language": "eng",
  "licence": "CC-BY",
  "licence_label": "CC BY",
  "licence_source": "article",
  "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "metadata_licence": null,
  "native_subjects": [
    [
      "openalex",
      "2738|Dementia and Cognitive Impairment Research"
    ]
  ],
  "openalex": "W7223200309",
  "pdf_url": "https://europepmc.org/articles/PMC13689881?pdf=render",
  "pmcid": "PMC13689881",
  "pmid": "42911872",
  "published": "2026-10-01",
  "publisher": null,
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/2h62f4yj6c004.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-10-30T12:20:14Z",
      "native_id": "MED:42911872",
      "source": "europepmc",
      "url": "https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42911872"
    }
  ],
  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "medicine",
      "origin": "openalex:2738|Dementia and Cognitive Impairment Research",
      "subfield": "psychiatry"
    }
  ],
  "title": "Exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation after stroke and the risk of incident dementia: an observational study from a global federated network.",
  "title_text": "Exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation after stroke and the risk of incident dementia: an observational study from a global federated network.",
  "type": "peer-reviewed",
  "updated_at": "2026-10-30T12:20:14Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/2h62f4yj6c004",
  "venue": "European stroke journal",
  "versions": []
}