Ginkgo PREVENTS Alzheimer's disease...

Today's post: Tuesday, 6-3-2008

Taking the herbal supplement Ginkgo Biloba, has been reported to improve & preserve memory in healthy older people. It’s an antioxidant. It’s been reported to help prevent excess clotting of the blood & improve brain circulation. And, it’s been reported to improve function some for early stage Alzheimer’s patients also.

We’ve already posted that frequent social contacts & a good social support network tend to prevent mental decline of all kinds.

We’ve posted that regular exercise grows new brain cells; tends to mostly prevent “normal” memory loss & “senior moments” in healthy people who do it regularly every week; & it makes Alzheimer’s disease less likely according to the studies.

We’ve posted that taking turmeric supplements (or Curcumin, its active ingredient) apparently prevents Alzheimer’s disease by helping enable your immune system to remove any beta amyloid that forms in your brain.

But today I read an email from Dr Singh Khalsa, the author of the book, Brain Longevity, in which he reports that he recently heard a paper on a study by a French researcher which found that taking ginkgo biloba prevented beta amyloid deposits or plaques in the brain.

(I’ve read that people taking anti-coagulants or “blood thinning” drugs may get too much reduction in blood clotting & may have problems from that if they also take ginkgo.

And, Wikipedia in addition to that said: “Ginkgo should also not be used by people who are taking certain types of antidepressants (MAOIs and SSRIs.)” It doesn’t say why.

WholeHealthMD.com reports that it may cause problems to combine taking ginkgo with “trazodone, a modified cyclic Antidepressant or "mood elevator" that works in a unique way.” Or taking it “with prochlorperazine, an antipsychotic drug” might cause problems.

But apparently, it is thought to be safe otherwise.)