Probiotics 'aid memory in people with Alzheimer's disease'

Conclusion This randomised controlled trial looked at whether probiotic supplements help improve cognitive function in patients with Alzheimer's disease over 12 weeks. It also investigated the effect of probiotics on biomarkers for inflammation and metabolism in the body. It found treatment with probiotic supplements resulted in a small improvement in cognitive function compared with the control group. But everyone remained severely cognitively impaired, and it's not clear if the change in score was clinically important in terms of function. Although these are interesting findings, there are a few things to bear in mind: This was a small trial involving 60 people. This intervention would need to be tested on a larger sample size to confirm the findings, as it's still possible that the change observed is a chance finding. The participants were mainly female – only 12 male patients were involved – and everyone had severe dementia at the start of the study, so it's unclear whether probiotics are able to prevent dementia in the general population. The trial was conducted for 12 weeks. As Alzheimer's is a progressive disease, it would be beneficial to monitor the long-term effects of probiotics in patients with Alzheimer's disease to know whether the improvement in cognitive function would last longer than three months. The participants in the trial were an average age of 80. It would be interesting to see if the same effect was observed in patients at an earli...
Source: NHS News Feed - Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Neurology Food/diet Source Type: news