Green Tea May Fight Against Mental Decline!
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Researchers have recently found that people who regularly drink green tea may have a lesser risk of mental decline as they grow older.
The study of about 1,000 Japanese adults in their 70s and older, found that the more green tea men and women drank, the lower their chances of having cognitive impairment.
The findings seem to give credence to evidence from laboratory experiments that show certain compounds in green tea may |
protect brain cells from the damaging processes that mark conditions like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease. |
The new research appears to be the first to find a lower risk of mental decline among green tea drinkers, as opposed to previous studies that only had mice and other animals as subjects.
They speculate that the possible protective effects of green tea may help explain Japan's lower rate of dementia, particularly Alzheimer's disease, compared with Europe and North America.
Dr Shinichi Kuriyama and colleagues at Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine report the findings in the current issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
The respondents in the study completed detailed questionnaires on their diets, overall physical health and lifestyle habits over the previous month. They likewise completed a standard test of cognitive functions such as memory, attention and language use. |
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The researchers found that older adults who drank two or more cups of green tea per day were about half as likely to show cognitive impairment as those who drank three cups or less each week. Men and women who averaged one cup per day fell somewhere in between.
The connection between green tea and mental function persisted when the researchers accounted for overall diet and factors such as smoking and exercise habits.
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However, the findings cannot demonstrate a cause-and-effect relationship.
The study was observational, not a controlled experiment, and there may be something about green-tea drinkers that explains the link between the beverage and sharper mental function, Kuriyama told Reuters Health.
Given the high prevalence and heavy burden of dementia, the researchers conclude, any benefit of drinking green tea could have a "considerable" public health impact.
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