Nutritional Drink Improves Alzheimer's

CHICAGORush University Medical Center is leading a nationwide clinical trial of a nutritional drink to determine whether it can improve cognitive performance in people with mild to moderate Alzheimer's. The study follows recently released results from an earlier trial conducted in Europe showing that the drink, called Souvenaid, improved verbal recall in people with mild disease who were followed for three months.

Results of the European study were released recently following publication in the journal Alzheimers & Dementia. In that study, 225 patients with mild Alzheimers were divided into two groupssome drank Souvenaid and the others sipped a non-medical drink every day for 12 weeks. Researchers found that the patients who drank Souvenaid improved in a delayed verbal recall task.

A total of 500 individuals who are taking medications approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the symptomatic treatment of mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease will be enrolled in the present study at 40 sites across the United States. In the double-blinded study, half of the participants will drink about 4 ounces of Souvenaid once a day for 24 weeks; the other half will drink a control product that is similar in flavor, appearance and composition, but without the Souvenaid nutrients.

Researchers will test whether the participants' cognitive and functional performanceincluding memory, language, attention/concentration, executive functioning, information processing and recallshows any greater improvement with Souvenaid than with medication alone.