Give ginkgo biloba its due: Studies show it helps improve overall function in dementia patients
Reset…Try Again
If you have dementia, or if you have a family history of dementia, or if your memory is starting to play tricks and you’re simply concerned about dementia, please take the most recent ginkgo study from the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) with a major grain of salt.
And then read about other ginkgo/dementia studies. (I’ll be glad to help you out with that.)
Who you gonna call?
When your kitchen sink springs a leak, do you call a hydro engineer with a specialty in urban water management? No. You call a plumber.
So if you want to study ginkgo biloba’s effects on dementia, do you pick a lead researcher who’s a neurologist with a specialty in Alzheimer’s? Sure, that’s one way to go. But wouldn’t it make more sense to pick an experienced herbalist, or a team of expert herbalists. Seems obvious, doesn’t it? ESPECIALLY if the study is sponsored by NCCAM and the Office of Dietary Supplements.
I should also mention that the neurologist described above – Steven D. DeKosky, M.D. – has received research grants from numerous drug companies and has served as consultant and/or and served on the advisory boards of Pfizer, Lilly, GlaxoSmithKline, Merck, etc.
Now…can you imagine where this study ended up? Yep. In the ditch.
Dr. Dekosky and his team recruited more than 3,000 subjects, aged 75 or older, with normal cognition or mild cognitive impairment. Half the subjects took 240 mg of ginkgo extract or placebo daily. After six years, both groups experienced about the same overall rates of dementia or Alzheimer’s.
Key detail: Age 75? That’s a bit late in the game to test a dementia PREVENTIVE. It’s like saving for retirement. Do you start saving at age 60? No – if you’re serious about saving, you start when you’re 30. And if you’re serious about preventing dementia, you start when you have about 45 candles on your birthday cake.
The age of evidence
Dr. Dekosky gave the Associated Press this assessment of ginkg “We don’t think it has a future as a powerful anti-dementia drug.”
Okay, but with one or two exceptions, we don’t actually expect an herb to be a “powerful drug.” We just want something that can help. And that’s the REALLY important point that was missed by the study and the coverage by AP and other media outlets: Ginkgo can help.
Let’s go back, way back, to an e-Alert I sent you six years ago.
In October 2002, the Alzheimer’s Society and the Cochrane Collaboration published a comprehensive review that examined more than 30 ginkgo biloba trials – some dating as far back as the mid-70s.
The Cochrane researchers concluded that the studies reveal convincing evidence that ginkgo extract may benefit cognition, emotional health, and activities of daily living in patients who are in the early stages of Alzheimer’s. In less than three months, many patients experienced positive results using a dosage of less than 200 mg per day.
NCCAM? I think you owe us another study.
Sources:
“Ginkgo Biloba for Prevention of Dementia” Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 300, No. 19, 11/19/08, jama.ama-assn.org
“Ginkgo Fails to Prevent Alzheimer’s in Large Study” Carla K. Johnson, Associated Press, 11/18/08, ap.org
