forget ginkgo biloba for memory help

by Diane Lofshult

Food for Thought:

Older people who take the dietary supplement ginkgo biloba to sharpen their memory should “forget about it,” says a study in the November 19, 2008, issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association. The goal of the study was to determine if taking the supplement would reduce the incidence of all-cause dementia or Alzheimer’s disease (AD) in elderly individuals with normal cognition and mild cognitive impairment (MCI).

In this randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial, older individuals were given a placebo or took the supplement between 2000 and 2008. The treated participants were given a twice-daily dose of 120 milligrams (mg) of ginkgo biloba.

“In this study, [ginkgo] biloba at 120 mg twice a day was not effective in reducing either the overall incidence rate of dementia or AD in elderly individuals with normal cognition or those with MCI,” the researchers concluded.