Third Study: Wonder Pill Stops Memory Loss

You can file this article under “we sound like a broken record” but for the third time in recent years, science points to a humble wonder pill as your first line of defense against memory loss.

That’s right, it’s a trilogy of “gold standard” studies with the first and second demonstrating how this pill improves brain function. Now, the publication of a third study makes it a grand slam, as all three show how well this pill can delay memory loss.

Best of all, this wonder pill is not a drug or chemical compound, it’s a 100 percent natural supplement. We’re talking about the humble multivitamin.

How powerful can a good multivitamin be? The research shows it can shave years of aging off your memory.

A typical multivitamin and mineral (MVM) supplement contains many essential nutrients important for brain health. Since nutritional deficiency is common as you get older, taking a supplement should improve brain function. Yet trial results have been inconsistent, with some showing modest benefits to cognition while others found no effect at all.

The reason is most likely because trials were short duration, involved small numbers of participants and had methodological limitations that obscured any effectiveness the supplement might have shown.

To counter these problems some of the world’s leading researchers at Harvard, Wake Forest and Columbia Universities collaborated to set up three robust randomized placebo-controlled clinical trials. They called them COSMOS (Cocoa Supplement and Multivitamin Outcomes Study) and each one used a different approach to assess cognition. By the way, while some of the research did include cocoa supplements—hence the trial name— these multivitamin studies did not.

Some of these results should sound familiar to you as we’ve reported on the first two studies in the past…

Multivitamin Slows Cognitive Decline 60 Percent, Shaves Three Years Off Memory

In the first COSMOS study, which used telephone-based cognitive assessments, a daily multivitamin improved overall cognition and memory and slowed cognitive decline by 60 percent.

In the second COSMOS study, which used web-based assessments in a separate group of participants, a daily multivitamin prevented three years of age-related memory decline.

The third COSMOS trial went further by including detailed in-person neuropsychological assessments. This would be a much tougher test for a multivitamin supplement to pass, but it did, and with flying colors.

Bolsters Episodic Memory

For the third trial, the research team enrolled 573 participants aged 60 or older. None were involved in the previous trials. The results showed that after two years, unlike the findings of the first study, there was no significant change in executive function, which is a group of cognitive skills needed to complete everyday tasks. But, in two key areas taking the multivitamin was significant.

Compared to placebo there was firstly, a modest improvement in overall cognition, and secondly, the multivitamin group had a markedly better change in episodic memory, which is used when consciously recalling a specific event in one’s life. This finding is important because disruptions to episodic memory are among the earliest signs and symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease.

This time around… 

Cognitive Aging Was Reduced by Two Years

In a second aspect of the most recent study, the researchers analyzed all three COSMOS trials together containing over 5,000 participants.

This showed “clear evidence”, the researchers wrote in their paper published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in January, “of MVM benefits on global (overall) cognition and episodic memory, the magnitude of effect on global cognition was equivalent to reducing cognitive aging by two years.”

They added that “early signs of cognitive decline may be delayed through a safe, efficacious, and broadly applicable intervention, such as a multivitamin-mineral (MVM) supplement.”

First author Chirag Vyas explained, saying, “The meta-analysis of three separate cognition studies provides strong and consistent evidence that taking a daily multivitamin, containing more than 20 essential micronutrients, helps prevent memory loss and slow down cognitive aging.”

“Exciting, stunning and strong…” results

His colleague, JoAnn Manson, who was involved in all three studies, described the results as “exciting…stunning and strong in their consistency [and] are a powerful indication of the overall benefits of multivitamins on memory and cognitive aging.”

The positive effects seen, she continued, probably occurred because “many people have deficiencies in one or more important micronutrients important for cognitive function,” among them vitamins B12 and D, lutein, and zinc.

Professor Manson added that there’s less than one possibility in a thousand the results could have occurred by chance. In other words, you can take the findings of COSMOS to the bank. She also remarked, “If this were an expensive drug, it would be aggressively marketed, even before there was evidence of long-term safety.”

We couldn’t agree more.

Donald Hensrud, Associate Professor of Nutrition and Preventive Medicine at the Mayo Clinic, who was not involved in the study, said, “While this study doesn’t replace recommendations to eat a healthy diet, it strengthens previous findings, and remains the best evidence there is to take a multivitamin, at least for people aged 60 and over.”

Our Takeaway

We’re not surprised by these results. In fact, one pioneering alternative health doctor used to say that his first treatment for reversing cognitive decline in his patients was simply giving them a quality high dose vitamin and mineral supplement. Reason being, like these researchers report, the average person is deficient in some essential brain nutrients—especially B vitamins—and by restoring healthy levels in the body the brain becomes well-functioning again.

The moral of the story: Find a quality multivitamin and mineral supplement and take it daily without fail. It’s probably one of the easiest ways to save your memory.