Neurology explores the intricate workings of the brain and nervous system, tackling everything from memory and movement to complex conditions like epilepsy and Alzheimer's. This field seeks to understand how our minds function and what happens when that delicate machinery falters, aiming to improve lives through better diagnosis and treatment.

At Gist.Science, we make the latest research from medRxiv accessible to everyone. We process every new preprint in this category, offering both straightforward plain-language explanations and detailed technical summaries so you can grasp the science at your own pace. Below are the latest papers in neurology, ready for you to explore.

🧠 neurology

Eligibility for shingles vaccination and hospital-coded dementia in England and Wales: a regression discontinuity analysis in England

This regression discontinuity analysis of English and Welsh data finds that while eligibility for the live-attenuated shingles vaccine significantly reduced hospital-coded shingles diagnoses, it had no detectable effect on hospital-coded dementia diagnoses.

Hamilton, F., Pinot de Moira, A., Bracher-Smith, M., Michalik, F., Chandran, S., Cattaneo, M. D., De Magalhaes, L., Hart (…)2026-07-21
🧠 neurology

Automated Detection of Motor Speech Disorders and Subtype Classification

This study demonstrates that automated detection of motor speech disorders is feasible and clinically promising, with pretrained models like HuBERT and articulatory-informed Phonet features significantly outperforming static acoustic features in binary classification while showing more limited stability for multi-label subtype classification across independent datasets.

Wang, F., Utianski, R. L., Barnard, L. R., Stricker, J. L., Clark, H. M., Meade, G. F., Jones, D. T., Whitwell, J. L., J (…)2026-07-19
🧠 neurology

24S-Hydroxycholesterol: A potential brain-derived biomarker of Huntington's Disease

This study identifies reduced plasma levels of the brain-derived metabolite 24S-hydroxycholesterol in manifest Huntington's disease patients compared to premanifest and healthy groups, suggesting its potential utility as a biomarker for monitoring disease progression and distinguishing disease stages through diagnostic modeling.

Ali Asgari, M., Langbehn, D. R., Skibinski, D. O. F., Lee, R., Griffiths, W. J., Wang, Y.2026-07-18
🧠 neurology

Correlation Between Clinical Presentation and Brain CT Findings in Acute Dizziness: A Retrospective Cross-Sectional Analysis at a Tertiary Referral Center

This retrospective study of 291 patients at a tertiary center found that while routine brain CTs for acute dizziness have a low diagnostic yield, specific clinical predictors such as ataxia, headache, and diabetes can effectively identify patients at higher risk for central pathology, whereas isolated vestibular symptoms like nausea and vomiting suggest a lower likelihood of abnormal findings.

Abbasi, A., Moghbel Baerz, M., Farhadi, M., Sadegh, R., Kavari, K., Rastaghi, F., Azadian, Z., Rajabi, A. H., Nasr, A.2026-07-18
🧠 neurology

Portable Ultra-Low Field MRI Deep-Learning Algorithms for White Matter Lesion Segmentation Improve Accuracy and Reflect Clinical Disability in Multiple Sclerosis

This study demonstrates that deep-learning algorithms, particularly PLAn-FL and nnU-Net, outperform machine-learning methods in accurately segmenting white matter lesions on portable 64mT MRI scans, with the resulting volume measurements showing significant correlations to clinical disability scores in multiple sclerosis patients.

Thommana, A. A., Donnay, C. A., Norato, G., Gaitan, M. I., Griffanti, L., Nair, G., Reich, D. S., Okar, S. V.2026-07-17
🧠 neurology

Curation of Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) Scores in the VA Million Veteran Program (MVP): Applications for Cognitive Aging Research

This study demonstrates that Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) scores systematically extracted from the VA Million Veteran Program's electronic health records are valid for cognitive aging research, showing significant associations with APOE ε4 status and dementia diagnoses across diverse ancestral groups.

Lopez, F. V., Gillis, M., Lee, S., Sakamoto, M. S., Zhang, R., VA Million Veteran Program,, Sherva, R., Logue, M., Merri (…)2026-07-16
🧠 neurology

Evaluating Goodness of Pronunciation and Phonological Posteriors as Objective Markers of Speech Severity in Motor Speech Disorders

This study demonstrates that goodness of pronunciation scores derived from self-supervised speech representations, particularly WavLM, serve as superior objective markers for assessing speech severity in motor speech disorders compared to traditional acoustic features and phonological posterior probabilities, while showing strong alignment with perceptual ratings of distortion and intelligibility.

Wang, F., Utianski, R. L., Duffy, J. R., Barnard, L. R., Botha, H.2026-07-16
🧠 neurology

Development of a Core Outcome Set for Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI-COS): Recommendations from a multistakeholder Delphi consensus study

This paper presents the development of a ten-item Core Outcome Set for Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI-COS) through a multistakeholder Delphi consensus process, aiming to standardize and prioritize patient-relevant outcomes in future research and clinical practice.

Gabb, V. G., Harding, S., McNair, A., Clayton, J., Barrett-Muir, W., Richardson, A., Dooley, J., Webb, J., Lemke, T., Co (…)2026-07-14
🧠 neurology

Gut-related Immune Activation in Parkinson's Disease with Asian LRRK2 Risk Variants: Associations with Systemic Inflammation and Clinical Severity

This study reveals that while gut permeability markers LBP and sCD14 do not differ based on Asian LRRK2 risk variants in Parkinson's disease, they are significantly associated with systemic inflammation and clinical severity, identifying LBP as a key marker of inflammatory burden in PD patients.

Toh, T. S., Ding, H. X., Khairul Anuar, A. N., Zulhaimi, N. S., Hor, J. W., Pang, Y. C., Kong, I. X., Zulkefli, J., Tay (…)2026-07-14
🧠 neurology

geneXplore: An Interactive Browser for X Chromosome-Wide Association Study Results

The paper introduces geneXplore, a freely accessible interactive web browser that addresses the lack of dedicated tools for X chromosome-wide association studies by providing systematic exploration of summary statistics across 1,944 phenotypes with specific support for distinguishing random X-inactivation, escape from X-inactivation, and sex-stratified analyses.

Cook, N., Boulais-Richard, J., Zeng, Y., Yang, C., Budde, J., Taliun, D., Gagliano Taliun, S. A., Cruchaga, C., Belloy (…)2026-07-14