Posted on 06/21/2005 3:47:01 AM PDT by Pharmboy
High-dose folic acid pills — providing as much of the nutrient as 2.5 pounds of strawberries — might help slow the cognitive decline of aging.
So says a Dutch study that's the first to show a vitamin could really improve memory.
The research, unveiled Monday at a meeting of Alzheimer's researchers, adds to mounting evidence that a diet higher in folate is important for a variety of health effects. It's already proven to reduce birth defects, and research suggests it helps ward off heart disease and strokes, too.
The new study doesn't show folic acid could prevent Alzheimer's — the people who tested the vitamin didn't have symptoms of that disease.
But as people age, some decline in memory and other brain functions is inevitable. Taking 800 micrograms of folic acid a day slowed that brain drain, reported lead researcher Jane Durga of Wageningen University in the Netherlands.
In the study, 818 cognitively healthy people ages 50 to 75 swallowed either folic acid or a dummy pill for three years.
On memory tests, the supplement users had scores comparable to people 5.5 years younger, Durga said. On tests of cognitive speed, the folic acid helped users perform as well as people 1.9 years younger.
That's significant brain protection, with a supplement that's already well-known to be safe, said Johns Hopkins University neuroscientist Marilyn Albert, who chairs the Alzheimer's Association's science advisory council.
"I think I would take folic acid, assuming my doctor said it was OK," Albert said. "We know Alzheimer's disease, the pathology, begins many, many years before the symptoms. We ought to be thinking about the health of our brain the same way we think about the health of our heart."
Indeed, there's enough research now suggesting that there are ways to gird the brain against age-related memory loss and Alzheimer's that the association has begun offering classes to teach people the techniques.
Topping the list:
_Exercise your brain. Using it in unusual ways increases blood flow and helps the brain wire new connections. That's important to build up what's called cognitive reserve, an ability to adapt to or withstand the damage of Alzheimer's a little longer.
In youth, that means good education. Later in life, do puzzles, learn to play chess, take classes.
_Stay socially stimulated. Declining social interaction with age predicts declining cognitive function.
_Exercise your body. Bad memory is linked to heart disease and diabetes because clogged arteries slow blood flow in the brain.
Experts recommend going for the triple-whammy of something mentally, physically and socially stimulating all at once: Coach your child's ball team. Take a dance class. Strategize a round of golf.
Diet's also important. While Alzheimer's researchers have long recommended a heart-healthy diet as good for the brain, Monday's folic acid study is the first to test the advice directly.
Previous studies have shown that people with low folate levels in their blood are more at risk for both heart disease and diminished cognitive function.
Durga said it's not clear how folic acid might work to protect the brain. Some studies suggest folate lowers inflammation; others suggest it may play a role in expression of dementia-related genes.
Folate is found in such foods as oranges and strawberries, dark-green leafy vegetables and beans. In the United States, it also is added to cereal and flour products. The recommended daily dose here is 400 micrograms; doctors advise women of childbearing age to take a supplement to ensure they get that much.
That being said, supplemetal folate is a good idea.
So the encouragement for large doses of B12 will most probably be followed by cautions that its widespread use will result in increase of some obscure disorder in about 0.002% of the population, and its use must be restricted immediately, to "by prescription only".
Seems like one of these studies comes-out every week. No wonder the vitamin industry is raking-in $11 billion a year in the U.S.
Perhaps I was not clear (it is a bit confusing). Masses doses of B12 appear harmless--it's the folic acid (which has some overlapping functions with B12)--that can hide some but not all the damage of B12 deficiency that can be the RARE bad actor here. Folic acid above 1 mg require a prescription and has needed the Rx since the 1950s or 1960s.
That's nice.
What were we talking about?
All in all, it is probably a good idea to take an RDA-level supplement a few times a week and extra folic acid at about the same rate.
Don't forget to take your supplements...Hmmmm.
Will this supplement help even if you are in your late 60's ? or is it too late????
Now if I can only remember to take the pills.
May I suggest that should you find any of the above necessary to become "stimulated", either mentally, physically, or socially, you are married to the wrong person and you are destined for a fate far worse than death. ;)
"Always listen to EXPERTS. They'll tell you what can't be done and why. Then do it." ... Robert Heinlein
Now if I can only remember to take it.
I hate you.
You mean I finally was faster to post a witty comment than somebody else around here?
Yes, but those people who take my lines earn my eternal wrath.
I'm going to make your kitchen floor all scuffy and muddy and stuff.
Since about 2.5 years ago -- when I passed my cholesterol test, but flunked my c reactive protein, my doctor prescribed a folic acid/B-vitamin supplement; I believe it's called folgard. (Too lazy to look it up.)
Unfortunately, folgard (sp?) caused some digestive problems. He okayed my switching to TriVita sublingual B-12, B-6, & Folic Acid. It's my understanding that the B vitamins and folic acid are supposed to help offset inflamation problems. (I haven't notice anything miraculous occurring with my recall abilities though.) ;)
The downside is that the folgard was covered by my drug card; the TriVita stuff isn't.
Folgard is a prescription and therefor covered. I would doubt very much that caused you any stomach upset (I am not doubting what you felt, I just am questioning the association between that and Folgard).
"You mean I finally was faster to post a witty comment than somebody else around here?"
That's a matter of opinion. LOL!
The folic acid has been shown to lower the blood value of another risk factor--homocysteine--rather than the inflammatory (C-reactive protein) risk factor. Ask your doc what the homocysteine value was and how it responded (on repeat testing) to the folic acid.
Wives are good for memory recall also.
Thanks! (Except if I ask him, it'll remind him that he's upset with me because I didn't go for my follow-up test.) ;)
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