Niacin Protective against Dementia in Aging

Taking niacin may help protect patients against Alzheimer's Disease and other forms of cognitive decline according to the results of a recent study. A research team followed 3,718 participants in the Chicago Health and Aging Project for six years and tracked their niacin intake and mental status via food frequency questionnaires and testing of cognitive functioning at three-year intervals. The subjects were 65 and older and did not have Alzheimer's Disease when the study began.

Scientists tested a random sample of 815 subjects, 131 of whom had developed Alzheimer's. When the niacin intake of the sample was examined, it was found that subjects who ranked in the top three-fifths of the sample's niacin consumption through supplements and foods had a 70% lower adjusted risk of developing the disease than those in the lowest sample. Even when the vitamin was obtained from food alone, the protective benefit was similar.

Cognitive decline was examined for all of the subjects and niacin was found to slow the process; this association was even stronger when the analysis excluded patients who had cardiovascular disease, low initial cognitive function scores, or less than 12 years of education. Subjects who consumed the most niacin had only 44% of the decline of those with the lowest intake of the vitamin.

J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry 75(8):1093-1099, 2004

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