Effects of Lifetime Cumulative Ginseng Intake on Cognitive Function in Late Life
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This study is part of the Korean Longitudinal Study on Cognitive Aging and Dementia (KLOSCAD), which is a population-based prospective cohort study. A baseline analysis of 6422 participants (mean age, 70.2) was completed, and follow-up was every 2 years. Data for 3918 participants who completed two follow-up evaluations were included in this study, with a questionnaire asking about initial age of ginseng intake and the number of days per month with ginseng intake. Additionally, all participants underwent geriatric neuropsychiatric evaluation with the CERAD battery. The group with high ginseng use (>5 years) had higher CERAD scores compared with the group that reported no ginseng use when controlling for various lifestyle and demographic factors. Notably, the group with high ginseng intake had a similar incidence of cognitive disorders as the groups with low and no ginseng intake. The authors speculate that this may be because ginseng improves cognition but does not delay cognitive disorders.
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Patients frequently ask neurologists about benefits of supplement use, and familiarity with studies like this one allow for an informed discussion.
– Shila Azodi, MD
abstract
This abstract is available on the publisher's site.
Access this abstract nowBACKGROUND
We investigated the effects of lifetime cumulative ginseng intake on cognitive function in a community-dwelling population-based prospective cohort of Korean elders.
METHODS
Community-dwelling elders (N = 6422; mean age = 70.2 ± 6.9 years, education = 8.0 ± 5.3 years, female = 56.8%) from the Korean Longitudinal Study on Cognitive Aging and Dementia were included. Among them, 3918 participants (61.0%) completed the 2-year and 4-year follow-up evaluations. Subjects were categorized according to cumulative ginseng intake at baseline evaluation; no use group, low use (< 5 years) group, and high use (≥ 5 years) group. One-way analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was conducted to compare the impact of cumulative ginseng intake on baseline Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Packet neuropsychological battery total score (CERAD total score) and Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) score among the three groups while adjusting for potential covariates. A repeated-measures ANCOVA was performed to investigate the impacts on the changes in CERAD total scores and MMSE scores during the 4 years of follow-up.
RESULTS
The high use group showed higher CERAD total scores compared to the no use group after controlling for age, sex, education years, socioeconomic status, smoking, alcohol intake, presence of hypertension, stroke history, Geriatric Depression Scale, Cumulative Illness Rating Scale, and presence of the APOE e4 allele (F(2, 4762) = 3.978, p = 0.019). The changes of CERAD total score for 2 or 4 years of follow-up did not differ according to the use of ginseng.
CONCLUSIONS
Cumulative ginseng use for longer than 5 years may be beneficial to cognitive function in late life.
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Additional Info
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Effects of Lifetime Cumulative Ginseng Intake on Cognitive Function in Late Life
Alzheimers Res Ther 2018 May 24;10(1)50, SK Lho, TH Kim, KP Kwak, K Kim, BJ Kim, SG Kim, JL Kim, TH Kim, SW Moon, JY Park, JH Park, S Byun, SW Suh, JY Seo, Y So, SH Ryu, JC Youn, KH Lee, DY Lee, DW Lee, SB Lee, JJ Lee, JR Lee, H Jeong, HG Jeong, JH Jhoo, K Han, JW Hong, JW Han, KW KimFrom MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.