The drug that helps you stand at attention could also help keep your attention.
In the hunt to ward off dementia, research out of the UK this week looked to assess whether existing drugs could be repurposed to fight the memory-robbing illness.
And it may come as a surprise that erection meds may help prevent people from going soft in the head.
The study, funded by an Alzheimer’s research charity and conducted at the University of Exeter, looked at 80 drugs that have already been approved for other applications.
They found three drugs did the tricks.
Zostavax, the shingles vaccine, showed the most promising results — but runners-up riluzole (originally developed to treat a muscle-weakening disease) and sildenafil (commonly sold as Viagra) made enough improvements to be flagged for further research related to Alzheimer’s.
According to the study, previous research shows a possible connection between the shingles virus and dementia. Alzheimer’s has been linked to immune system malfunctions, some of which the shingles vaccine could potentially combat.
The other two drugs each had an effect on the build-up of a protein called tau, which, when functioning normally, helps to stabilize the internal structure of nerve cells. In Alzheimer’s, however, an abnormal form of tau can accumulate and actually cause the internal skeleton to fall apart, according to the Alzheimer’s Association.
Viagra is typically prescribed for its ability to increase blood-flow to the groin. But it might have a similarly invigorating effect on the brain.
“In mouse studies, sildenafil also improved thinking and memory, possibly by increasing blood flow to the brain,” according to Science Daily.
Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia are medical lightning rods in the UK, where pressure to find a cure is mounting. Dementia is the overall leading cause of death across the pond, responsible for nearly 1 million cases per year.
Within the aging US populace, annual dementia cases are expected to double by 2060, according to the National Institutes of Health.
Surveys show that few people know which early warning signs to look for — such as short-term memory loss, difficulty coming up with words, trouble with planning and multitasking, personality shifts and even financial issues — leading to missed diagnoses and more aggressive cases.
For now, researchers are all calling for clinical trials to test exactly how effective these three repurposed medications might be at preventing or treating dementia.
Dr. Anne Corbett, Professor of Dementia Research at the University of Exeter, told Science Daily that this study is just the beginning of starting to understand how we can repurpose drugs for brain health.
“It’s important to stress that these drugs need further investigation before we will know whether they can be used to treat or prevent Alzheimer’s,” she said. “We now need to see robust clinical trials to understand their true value and know for certain if they are effective to treat or prevent Alzheimer’s.”
Drugs like Aspirin have been repurposed to help reduce risk of heart attack and stroke, and these researchers are wondering if similar principles could be applied to Alzheimer’s.
But it’s not just older drugs that are being repurposed for Alzheimer’s patients.
Though there is currently no cure, new FDA-approved drugs have been developed specifically for the disease, too — designed to slow cognitive decline and lessen symptoms, offering hope for the more than 10 million people worldwide with the disease.
