Curcumin and Yoga Therapy for Those at Risk for Alzheimer's Disease

• Status: Active, not recruiting
• Trial end date: 2020-12-31
• Target enrollment: 0
• Participant gender: All

Summary

Physical exercise has proven to improve memory including in the elderly. Drugs developed to stop the underlying disease processes that cause Alzheimer's disease may succeed only with multimodal efforts to stimulate brain function. One purpose of the study is to test the clinical benefits of curcumin, a safe and effective compound isolated from the turmeric root (a component of Indian curry spices), which has been found to inhibit several potential disease pathways in Alzheimer's disease. Another purpose of this study is to determine how the addition of a physical exercise program in individuals with early memory problems may affect memory function or brain imaging and blood-based markers associated with Alzheimer's disease.

• Phase: Phase 2
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers?: No

Details

• Lead Sponsor: VA Office of Research and Development
• Treatments: Curcumin

Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

• age between 50 and 90 years;

• Mini-Mental Status Exam (MMSE) scores greater than 24;

• subjective cognitive complaints based on subjective cognitive impairment questionaire (Gifford et al. 2015) including non-amnestic or amnestic cognitive deficits MCI (performance 1.5 standard deviation (SD) below normative means on The Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's Disease (CERAD) word list learning test);

• essentially intact activities of daily living (FAQ scores < 6);

• Sedentary (exercise < 30 minutes a day, 3 times a week);

• ambulatory, able exercise safely without cardiovascular symptoms, and able to pass a graded treadmill test modified for the elderly;

• able to arrange transportation to the study;

• Willing and intellectually able to understand and to sign an informed consent and to adhere to protocol requirements;

• community dwelling; and

• fluent in written and spoken English

• must screen positive for a Modified abbreviated MCI or SCD screen on phone, before coming in to clinic for extensive testing

Exclusion Criteria:

• diagnosis of dementia,

• concurrent substance abuse disorder,

• psychosis or mood disorder,

• neurological disease affecting motor or cognitive abilities (e.g. Parkinson's disease),or other significant uncontrolled medical problems,

• cannot get up and down from floor

• initiation of any new medications/treatment for cognitive impairment (i.e. cholinesterase inhibitor, memantine) < 6 months prior to study enrollment