Respond to prefers-color-scheme dark in app web views

Follow section front redirects in Spectrum

Enable NLP source in PCS for load testing

Switch off the News Alerts Survey Widget when we have enough responses

Poll to determine if new LUF updates are available

Allows the winning A/B test variant to be turned on without Spectrum deployment

Show infinite scrolling sections in Assembler MultiView

Show option for NLP article summaries in Action Bar

Show NLP summaries collection recirc on article pages

A general feature flag for Recipe Features that aren't yet released

Feature flag for media team features that aren't yet released

Use new Orca video player for preroll plugin in Spectrum

Show the snow tracker (instead of the heat tracker) on Spectrum

Ask Amy: I want to be closer with my brother. He never reaches out to me.

Miss Manners: I’m offended by a golfer’s skirt choice

Carolyn Hax: Family pushes siblings to ‘make amends’ after their mother’s death

Middle East conflict live updates: WHO says health services in south Gaza will run out of fuel in three days

Commerce Department revokes more export licenses to China’s Huawei

U.S. signals optimism for Gaza cease-fire as Israel moves into Rafah 

‘Look at the U.S.A.’: A photographer’s reflection on post-9/11 conflict

How Trump’s allies amplify his Truth Social messages to the wider world

In photos: The scene after tornadoes struck Michigan and Oklahoma 

RFK Jr’s ‘history lesson’ on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine flunks the fact test

Election 2024 latest news: Biden back in the battleground state of Wisconsin

In court, Stormy Daniels pulled a Trump on Trump 

France tries to shed its rude reputation ahead of the Olympics

Don’t be a jerk at the airport: A guide for headphones

The new cure-all for vacation excess: the IV drip 

Nats go over .500 the hard way by beating the O’s and Corbin Burnes

A look at what has changed since the Nationals were last above .500

Baseball can crush rookies. Why hasn’t it crushed Trey Lipscomb?

A college professor wants to use Section 230 against Big Tech

Apple plays up AI potential in new iPads

In Arizona, election workers trained with deepfakes to prepare for 2024

Social Security has to be fixed. But you still need your own savings.

An I bond is now at 4.28 percent. Are they still a good deal?

Use these 6 points to say no to a college you and your kid can’t afford

The Trump-Biden battle over the 2017 tax cut

That time football legend, rig-driving eligible bachelor Biden was arrested

The FTC’s noncompete clause rule goes too far

The next global crisis could come from the sun. We should prepare now.

The crisis Biden and Trump don’t want to deal with

Postal worker finds WWII-era letters, drives 5 hours to deliver them

Strangers help Sesame Street puppeteer after heirloom necklace was stolen

Teen grabs wheel when driver passes out and school bus veers into traffic

US-VOTE-POLITICS-ECONOMY-BIDEN

iStock

A daily multivitamin may slow memory loss among those 60 and older by about two years, according to a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0002916523663427?via%3Dihub" target=_blank>study</a> released Thursday.

It is the third in a series of studies assessing the cognitive effects of a daily multivitamin on older adults. And a systematic review, or meta-analysis, of the three studies accompanying the most recent paper said their cumulative results were similar: The group taking a multivitamin was two years younger in memory function compared with the group taking a placebo. The meta-analysis was conducted by the same researchers who conducted the three studies.

thenewreset

Practical tips and smart solutions for your health, technology, travel, food, money, home and more. Elevate your daily life with expertise from The Washington Post. <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/experts-for-every-day/" target=_blank>Find it all here</a>.

Each study had “nonoverlapping” participants and used different methods, producing findings that varied slightly. But collectively they add to growing evidence that taking a daily multivitamin can have a significant impact on cognition among older people.

Cognitive decline is among the top health concerns for most older adults, said <a href="https://researchers.mgh.harvard.edu/profile/15967588/Chirag-Vyas" target=_blank>Chirag Vyas</a>, an instructor in investigation in the psychiatry department at Massachusetts General Hospital and the most recent study’s first author. A daily supplement provides “an appealing and accessible approach” to slowing it, he said.

The studies are part of the COcoa Supplement and Multivitamin Outcomes Study (<a href="https://cosmostrial.org/" target=_blank>COSMOS</a>), a larger body of research examining the health effects of certain dietary supplements; it is a collaboration of Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Columbia University and Wake Forest University.

The most recent study of 573 individuals found statistically significant improvements in short- and long-term memory — recalling a list of words provided to them during testing, for example — among those taking a multivitamin. But there was less benefit than in the first study for executive function tasks such as counting backward or timed naming of animals or vegetables, said <a href="https://prevmed.bwh.harvard.edu/joann-e-manson-md-dph/" target="_blank">JoAnn Manson</a>, chief of Brigham’s division of preventive medicine and co-leader of the COSMOS study with <a href="https://prevmed.bwh.harvard.edu/howard-d-sesso-scd-mph/" target="_blank">Howard Sesso</a>, associate director of the division.

The first <a href="https://alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/alz.12767" target=_blank>study</a>, which tested participants’ cognition through telephone interviews, showed a 1.8-year delay in memory loss and cognitive aging, whereas the second <a href="https://ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S0002-9165(23)48904-6/fulltext" target=_blank>study</a>, which involved web-based assessments, found that the multivitamin group showed an estimated 3.1 fewer years of memory loss compared with the placebo group. The third study showed a two-year delay in memory loss.

The first study showed a “significant” benefit in both memory and executive function, whereas the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2023/05/24/multivitamin-benefits-aging-memory-loss/" target="_blank">second </a><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2023/05/24/multivitamin-benefits-aging-memory-loss/" target="_blank">study</a> focused primarily on memory, not executive function, Manson said.

Many patients are worried about having <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/07/05/aduhelm-new-alzheimers-drug-amyloid/" target="_blank">Alzheimer’s</a>, said <a href="https://med.uth.edu/neurology/2022/10/31/paul-e-schulz-md/" target="_blank">Paul E. Schulz</a>, professor of neurology and director of the Neurocognitive Disorders Center at the McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston. Often, though, it is aging-related normal cognitive decline, he said.

“Then people ask me: ‘I’m glad it’s not Alzheimer’s, but is there anything I can do about it?’” said Schulz, who was not involved in the research. “This study suggests the intriguing possibility that some degree of normal aging can be staved off by simple vitamin supplementation.”

‘Stunning’ results in multivitamin study

“The results are stunning and strong in their consistency,” said Manson, also a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. “Each study shows a slightly different result but, taken together, are a powerful indication of the overall benefits of multivitamins on memory and cognitive aging.”

The research — all randomized placebo-controlled clinical trials, considered the “gold standard” in methodology — studied 5,000 participants and lasted two to three years. The latest study and meta-analysis appeared Thursday in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition<i>.</i>

The probability that these findings would occur by chance is less than 1 in 1,000, according to calculations in the meta-analysis, Manson said. This increases “the likelihood that these are real effects of the multivitamins,” she said.

All studies used a commonly available multivitamin — <a href="https://www.centrum.com/products/multivitamins/centrum-silver-adults-50-plus/" target=_blank>Centrum Silver for Adults</a> (age 50+). But, though they haven’t been studied, “any high-quality multivitamin is likely to provide similar benefits,” Manson said.

“We have three separate studies, plus a combined analysis, that confirm the findings,” she said. “If this were an expensive drug, it would be aggressively marketed, even before there was evidence of long-term safety.” Multivitamins are over-the-counter and affordable, and “we already know they are safe when taken for many years,” she said.

The third study and the meta-analysis were funded by investigator-initiated grants from Mars Edge, the life sciences division of Mars Inc., and the National Institutes of Health. Multivitamin and placebo tablets and packaging were donated by the maker of Centrum Silver, Pfizer Consumer Healthcare (now Haleon), which did not provide funding, the researchers said.

Sesso additionally reported receiving investigator-initiated grants from Pure Encapsulations and Pfizer, and honoraria or travel for lectures from the Council for Responsible Nutrition, BASF, NIH and the American Society for Nutrition during the conduct of the study.

The first two studies were racially and ethnically diverse because the interviews took place via telephone or online, while the third was less so because it involved in-person testing of participants confined to the Boston area — a study limitation the researchers acknowledged.

Differences in participants and methodology probably contributed to the variances in the results, Manson said.

“The vast majority of the participants were White, which doesn’t reflect the population of older adults as a whole,” said <a href="https://providers.upmc.com/provider/Christine+E.+Kistler/2587424" target=_blank>Christine Kistler</a>, an associate professor of geriatrics at the University of Pittsburgh who was not involved in any of the studies. “I also wish the studies had been conducted over a longer time period.”

Kistler also said that “people may want to hedge their bets and take a multivitamin, since there is no harm, but I will stick to healthy eating, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/03/13/alzheimers-exercise/" target=_blank>exercise</a> and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/wellness/dementia-sleep-deprivation-link-research/2021/05/07/1b4a0772-ae99-11eb-b476-c3b287e52a01_story.html" target=_blank>good sleep</a> for now.”

Individuals could obtain essential vitamins and minerals necessary for brain health through <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2023/09/18/diet-brain-health-preventing-alzheimers/" target="_blank">healthy food</a>, Manson said. But “many people have deficiencies in one or more important micronutrients important for cognitive function,” among them <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2023/12/04/vitamin-b12-supplements-energy-fatigue/" target="_blank">vitamins B12</a> and<b> </b><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2022/09/12/vitamin-d-supplement-deficiency-covid/" target="_blank">D</a>, lutein and zinc, she said.

The Centrum product contains them. But “that doesn’t mean people should forsake healthy eating because they are taking multivitamins,” she said.

<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/06/19/essential-multivitamin-ingredients/" target=_blank>Multivitamins</a> and minerals are already popular among Americans. More than <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db399.htm#section_3" target=_blank>39 percent</a> of those older than 60 take them, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“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 age 60 and over,” said <a href="https://www.mayoclinic.org/biographies/hensrud-donald-d-m-d-m-s/bio-20053543" target=_blank>Donald Hensrud</a>, a nutrition specialist at the Mayo Clinic, also not involved in the study.

Sign up for the Well+Being newsletter, your source of expert advice and simple tips to help you live well every day

Marlene Cimons is a Washington-based freelance writer who specializes in health, science and the environment. She was a Washington reporter for the Los Angeles Times covering public health, biomedical research policy, and food and drug regulation.

Marlene Cimons

Multivitamins may slow memory loss in older adults

the-washington-post

VItamin

Contributor

Food

Fitness

Mind

Body

Life

Well+Being

washpost

Well+Being Mind

Well+Being: Mental Health

Stories about mental health, meditation, mindfulness and brain health from The Washington Post’s Well+Being section.

Well+Being from The Washington Post covers healthy living, including nutrition, fitness, mental health, relationships, chronic illness and disability.