B1 Pill for Alzheimer Disease
A completely different approach to stopping the progression of Alzheimer’s disease pioneered by a research institute based in Westchester County, NY is now being tested nationwide.
The Burke Neurological Institute (BNI), an affiliation of Weill Cornell Medicine, in partnership with the Alzheimer’s Disease Cooperative Study (ADCS) at University of California San Diego and Columbia University Irving Medical Center, have launched a national clinical trial to investigate the therapeutic potential of a BNI and Weill Cornell Medicine-developed form of benfotiamine, a synthetic version of vitamin B1 (thiamine), as a treatment for mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and early Alzheimer’s disease (AD).
The BenfoTeam trial (The Phase 2A-2B study) taking place at 50 sites across the U.S. will evaluate the effects of benfotiamine on cognitive function and whether high doses benefit people 50-89 with mild AD and MCI. The trial is funded by the National Institute on Aging (NIA), a part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Benfotiamine is a synthetic drug which can increase blood thiamine up to 100 times the normal level. These levels of blood thiamine cannot be achieved by taking thiamine alone. The brain tissue in people with AD shows a thiamine deficiency, even with a sufficient supply of thiamine in a person’s blood. The trial is investigating whether the delivery of thiamine via drug will increase the amount of thiamine getting to the brain and slow cognitive decline in people with early AD. Currently, 5.8 million Americans are living with AD with this number projected to rise to nearly 14 million people by 2050.
