[BITList] Good News - Weekly curry 'may fight dementia'

[John Feltham]

  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8080630.stm


Weekly curry 'may fight dementia'


The key ingredient appears to be turmeric

Eating a curry once or twice a week could help prevent the onset of  
Alzheimer's disease and dementia, a US researcher suggests.

The key ingredient is curcumin, a component of the spice turmeric.

Curcumin appears to prevent the spread of amyloid protein plaques -  
thought to cause dementia - in the brain.

But the theory, presented at the Royal College of Psychiatrists'  
annual meeting, has been given a lukewarm reception by UK experts.

	
If you have a good diet and take plenty of exercise, eating curry  
regularly could help prevent dementia
Professor Murali Doraiswamy
Duke University

Amyloid plaques, along with tangles of nerve fibres, are thought to  
contribute to the degradation of the wiring in brain cells, eventually  
leading to symptoms of dementia.

Professor Murali Doraiswamy, of Duke University in North Carolina,  
said there was evidence that people who eat a curry meal two or three  
times a week have a lower risk of dementia.

He said researchers were testing the impact of higher doses - the  
equivalent of going on a curry spree for a week - to see if they could  
maximise the effect.


Animal studies

Professor Doraiswamy told the meeting: "There is very solid evidence  
that curcumin binds to plaques, and basic research on animals  
engineered to produce human amyloid plaques has shown benefits."

"You can modify a mouse so that at about 12 months its brain is  
riddled with plaques.

"If you feed this rat a curcumin-rich diet it dissolves these plaques.  
The same diet prevented younger mice from forming new plaques.

"The next step is to test curcumin on human amyloid plaque formation  
using newer brain scans and there are plans for that."

Professor Doraiswamy said a clinical trial was now underway at the  
University of California, Los Angeles, to test curcumin's effects in  
Alzheimer's patients.

He said research had also examined turmeric's therapeutic potential  
for treating conditions such as cancer and arthritis.


Good diet

He stressed that eating a curry could not counter-balance the  
increased risk of dementia associated with a poor diet.

	
Indian communities that regularly eat curcumin have a surprisingly low  
incidence of Alzheimer's disease but we don't yet know why
Dr Susanne Sorensen
Alzheimer's Society

However, he said: "If you have a good diet and take plenty of  
exercise, eating curry regularly could help prevent dementia."

Professor Doraiswamy predicted it might be possible to develop a curry  
pill which had the same therapeutic effect.

However, Rebecca Wood, of the Alzheimer's Research Trust, stressed  
that people would need to eat a lot of curry - over 100g of turmeric  
curry powder - to get a clinical dose of curcumin.

She said: "Professor Doraiswamy's unpublished  research applies only  
to animal models; his hypothesis has not been confirmed in human  
clinical trials.

"We look forward to the results of the human curcumin trial at UCLA."

Dr Susanne Sorensen, of the Alzheimer's Society, said: "Indian  
communities that regularly eat curcumin have a surprisingly low  
incidence of Alzheimer's disease but we don't yet know why.

"Alzheimer's Society is keen to explore the potential benefits of  
curcumin in protecting the brain and we are conducting our own  
research into this area.

"A cheap, accessible and safe treatment could transform the quality of  
life of thousands of people with the condition."










ooroo

Bad typists of the word, untie.




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