8 Natural Ways to Lower Homocysteine Levels

8 Natural Ways to Lower Homocysteine

The are several natural ways to lower homocysteine that can help support your overall wellbeing.

If you’ve discovered that your homocysteine level is higher than you’d like, the good news is that it’s often one of the most responsive biomarkers to diet and lifestyle changes. Small, consistent improvements in nutrition, physical activity and everyday habits can make a meaningful difference.

This guide focuses on eight practical, evidence-informed strategies that may help support healthy homocysteine levels, from eating more folate-rich foods and optimising key B vitamins to improving sleep, staying active and reducing alcohol intake.

If you’re looking for a complete explanation of what homocysteine is, why it matters, what causes elevated levels, how to interpret your test results and the science behind lowering homocysteine, read our complete guide to lowering homocysteine first. This article is designed to help you put that knowledge into practice.

Before trying to lower your homocysteine, it’s worth making sure you understand your test result. If you’ve already had a blood test, our guide to Homocysteine Levels Explained can help you interpret your homocysteine level and understand what it may mean for your health.

Homocysteine is a key indicator for cognitive and overall health. As we can see, with a few dietary tweaks, lifestyle upgrades, and targeted nutrients, you can lower your homocysteine, support methylation, and quite literally upgrade your brain!

Start today:

Join our research and test your homocysteine level today. Purchase a single homocysteine test here or get it as part of the DRIfT 5 in 1 test, which also measures your antioxidant status (another world first in accurate home testing), omega-3, vitamin D and HbA1c.
Read more in the Upgrade Your Brain book – This fully referenced guide offers practical strategies to improve your brain health – including how to lower homocysteine through diet, lifestyle, and supplementation.
Support our charitable work by becoming a FRIEND. From just £5 a month, you can help fund vital research and public education. Become a FRIEND today

Food for the Brain is a not-for-profit educational and research charity that offers a free Cognitive Function Test and assesses your Dementia Risk Index to be able to advise you on how to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle.

By completing the Cognitive Function Test you are joining our grassroots research initiative to find out what really works for preventing cognitive decline. We share our ongoing research results with you to help you make brain-friendly choices.

Please support our research by becoming a Friend of Food for the Brain.

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What can you do, practically and quickly, to reduce your risk of developing Alzheimer’s?

The International Alzheimer’s Prevention Expert Group, including our founder Patrick Holford, has identified four key areas that could cut your future risk by over 80% – down to less than a quarter – if addressed early.

The four “quick wins”? Increase your vitamin D, omega-3, and B vitamins, and reduce your intake of sugar and refined carbs.

1. Vitamin D: The Sunshine Factor

Vitamin D is primarily made in your skin through sun exposure, particularly at midday in the summer. However, in the winter – especially in the UK and other northern countries – you cannot make enough, so supplementation is essential. A Dutch study found that people with low levels of vitamin D, omega-3s, and B vitamins were over four times more likely to develop dementia¹. Those who supplement with vitamin D have around a third less risk².

Even levels below 62.5 nmol/L (25 ng/mL) increase risk. A French study found that low vitamin D levels tripled Alzheimer’s risk³. The darker your skin, the more sun exposure you need – which makes supplementation all the more vital for many.

2. Omega-3: Feed Your Brain with Fish

Fish is a true brain food – rich in omega-3s, vitamin D, and B12. Eating fish at least once a week reduces Alzheimer’s risk by a third⁴. A recent review confirmed that a daily serving cuts the risk of cognitive decline by 30%⁵.

Omega-3 fats (especially DHA) quite literally build brain cells. The UK Biobank study of over 250,000 people found that those with higher omega-3 levels had a 20% lower risk of dementia⁶. A US study also found that a higher omega-3 index correlated with more white matter in the brain and better cognitive function⁷.

Professor William Harris of the Fatty Acid Research Institute calls it “a safe, simple, cheap and effective tool to forestall Alzheimer’s.”

3. B Vitamins: The Brain Fixers

B6, B12, and folate don’t just support brain function – they’re essential for fixing omega-3s into your brain’s cell membranes. Without them, homocysteine – a toxic amino acid – builds up in your blood. High levels (above 11 μmol/L) are strongly linked to brain shrinkage and Alzheimer’s.

Half of people over 60 in the US have homocysteine levels above 11. The Dutch study found that risk rises even above 8 – a level many people exceed.

As Professor Joshua Miller from Rutgers University says, raised homocysteine is an early warning sign: “a canary in the coal mine.” The good news? It’s easily lowered with a B vitamin supplement – ideally one containing 500 mcg of B12, methylfolate, and B6.

More greens, beans, nuts, and lentils also help. A recent study showed that replacing just one serving of processed meat with nuts or beans (rich in folate) cut dementia risk by 19%⁸.

4. Sugar and Refined Carbs: Silent Brain Saboteurs

The more sugar a person eats – including refined white carbohydrate foods such as bread, pastries, pasta, and rice – the higher their risk of both diabetes and dementia. Fizzy drinks and ultra-processed foods, sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup, are particularly bad for the brain.
“The brain needs the most energy of any organ, so it has the most mitochondria to make it. Sugar damages mitochondria,” says Dr Robert Lustig from the University of California, San Francisco.

A study just published this month in Neurology involving 2 million people shows that those with sugar problems (metabolic syndrome) are 24% more likely to develop dementia early¹⁰.
Keeping blood glucose levels in the low–normal range is reflected by a low glycosylated haemoglobin (HbA1c), which is the blood test doctors use to diagnose diabetes. Having a lower HbA1c is associated with reduced risk for dementia in several studies⁹. A recent study of 374,021 older men with diabetes found that keeping HbA1c stable over three years cut the risk of dementia by a third¹¹.

Want to know what’s driving your brain risk?

Take our free 3-minute Alzheimer’s Prevention Check at alzheimersprevention.info – or, for the full picture, order the four-in-one home blood test to measure your omega-3 index, vitamin D, homocysteine and HbA1c: foodforthebrain.org/tests

Food for the Brain is a not-for-profit educational and research charity that offers a free Cognitive Function Test and assesses your Dementia Risk Index to be able to advise you on how to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle.

By completing the Cognitive Function Test you are joining our grassroots research initiative to find out what really works for preventing cognitive decline. We share our ongoing research results with you to help you make brain-friendly choices.

Please support our research by becoming a Friend of Food for the Brain.

References:

1  van Soest APM., et al Alzheimers Dement. 2024 Jul;20(7):4594-4601

2 Ghahremani M, et al. Vitamin D supplementation and incident dementia: Effects of sex, APOE, and baseline cognitive status. Alzheimers Dement (Amst). 2023 Mar;15(1):e12404. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/dad2.12404

 3 Feart C, et al. Associations of lower vitamin D concentrations with cognitive decline and long-term risk of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease in older adults. Alzheimers Dement. 2017 Nov;13(11):1207-1216. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jalz.2017.03.003

4 Beydoun MA, et al. Epidemiologic studies of modifiable factors associated with cognition and dementia: systematic review and meta-analysis. BMC Public Health. 2014;14:643. doi: https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-14-643

5 Godos J, et al. Fish consumption, cognitive impairment and dementia: an updated dose-response meta-analysis of observational studies. Aging Clin Exp Res. 2024;61:3731–3739. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-024-02823-6

6 Sala-Vila A, et al. Plasma Omega-3 Fatty Acids and Risk for Incident Dementia in the UK Biobank Study: A Closer Look. Nutrients. 2023 Nov;15(23):4896.

7 Loong S, et al. Omega-3 Fatty Acids, Cognition, and Brain Volume in Older Adults. Brain Sci. 2023;13:1278. doi: https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci13091278

8 Li Y, et al. Long-term intake of red meat in relation to dementia risk and cognitive function in US adults. Neurology.2025;104(3):e210286. doi: https://doi.org/10.1212/WNL.0000000000210286

9 Luchsinger JA, et al. Hyperinsulinemia and risk of Alzheimer disease. Neurology. 2004;63(7):1187–92. doi:https://doi.org/10.1212/01.WNL.0000140292.04932.04932.87;  see also Abbatecola AM, et al. Insulin resistance and executive dysfunction in older persons. J Am Geriatr Soc.2004;52(10):1713–

8. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1532-5415.2004.52466.x ;see also Xu WL, et al. Uncontrolled diabetes increases the risk of Alzheimer’s disease: a population-based cohort study. Diabetologia. 2009;52(6):1031–

9. doi: 10.1007/s00125-009-1323-x ;see also Hassing LB, et al. Type 2 diabetes mellitus contributes to cognitive decline in old age: a longitudinal population-based study. J Int Neuropsychol Soc. 2004;10(4):599–607. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1355617704104165
; see also Yaffe K, et al. Glycosylated hemoglobin level and development of mild cognitive impairment or dementia in older women. J Nutr Health Aging. 2006;10(4):293–5. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16886099/ ; see also Roberts RO, et al. Diabetes and elevated hemoglobin A1c levels are associated with brain hypometabolism but not amyloid accumulation. J Nucl Med. 2014;55(5):759–64. https://jnm.snmjournals.org/content/55/5/759 

10  Lee JY, Han K, Kim J, Lim JS, Cheon DY, Lee M. Association Between Metabolic Syndrome and Young-Onset Dementia: A Nationwide Population-Based Study. Neurology. 2025 May 27;104(10):e213599. doi: 10.1212/WNL.0000000000213599. Epub 2025 Apr 23. PMID: 40267374.11 Underwood PC, et al. HbA1c time in range and dementia. JAMA Netw Open. 2024;7(8):e2425354. doi: https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.25354

Patrick Holford’s new book claims that almost no one needs to develop Alzheimer’s.

Fewer than 1% of Alzheimer’s cases are genetic, and amyloid deposits – long targeted by new drugs – are neither the cause of the disease nor its cure.

Alzheimer’s is the consequence of a ‘perfect storm’ – a combination of poor diet, unhealthy lifestyle and harmful environmental factors that affect the structure, function or utilisation of the brain, says Patrick Holford,  our founder and author of Alzheimer’s: Prevention is the Cure. He says: “Every single known risk factor affects one of these, and it is combinations of these risk factors – which are under our control – that lead to cognitive decline, first experienced as brain fog and forgetfulness”.

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The book stems from a major global Alzheimer’s prevention project by the charity Food for the Brain, which has assessed the cognitive function of hundreds of thousands of people through a free test, followed by a comprehensive diet and lifestyle questionnaire that calculates their future risk – and shows how to lower it.

“We can detect declining cognitive function from as young as 18. The youngest non-genetic Alzheimer’s diagnosis is just 19,” says Holford, who founded the charity to help prevent Alzheimer’s. “We see a steady decline in cognitive function from the early twenties, with most people starting to show significant cognitive impairment in their seventies and eighties. But this decline cannot only be arrested – it can be reversed with the right diet, supplements and lifestyle choices.”

“Becoming an Alzheimer’s patient is almost always a choice,” says neurologist Dr David Perlmutter, a member of the charity’s Alzheimer’s Prevention Expert Group who also believes that diet and lifestyle, much more than genes, are driving the increase in Alzheimer’s.

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The book  (out today!) explains all the known risk factors we can change – and the extent to which doing so reduces future risk. Particularly important are what Holford calls ‘the four horsemen of the brain health apocalypse’: lack of brain fats, lack of B vitamins, lack of antioxidants, and too much sugar and refined foods. Increasing omega-3 intake from oily fish and supplements cuts risk by about 20%, as does optimising vitamin D levels. Vitamin D is produced in the skin when exposed to sunlight, with some also obtained from oily fish, but supplementation is needed during the winter months. Those who supplement with vitamin D have about one third less risk of developing dementia.

The single biggest–and most easily eliminated–risk factor, is lack of B vitamins, leading to high levels of the toxic amino acid homocysteine. “Homocysteine, if raised above 11 µmol/L, causes brain shrinkage and cognitive decline. If lowered with B vitamins, both shrinkage and decline are arrested. It is the only risk factor for which the evidence is strong enough to say it is causal.” says Holford. “Mine is 7 µmol/L but my wife’s, despite eating the same food, was 15µmol/L – right in the brain-shrinking zone. She now supplements high-dose B12, B6 and folate and her level has dropped to the same as mine. You would never know without testing. We are both in our sixties.” He estimates that half of those over-60 have a homocysteine level above 11, increasing their risk by about one-third.

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“This is why we are now testing people, with a home-test kit, for homocysteine, vitamin D and omega-3 index. If the omega-3 index is below 8% – as it is for many – that predicts cognitive decline and loss of brain density.”

The test kit also measures HbA1c, which GPs use to diagnose diabetes. However, the optimal level for Alzheimer’s prevention is lower than the threshold used to diagnose diabetes. Eating less sugar, fewer refined and ultra-processed foods, and reducing total carbohydrate intake also cuts dementia risk by about 20%.

Another big risk reducer is increasing intake of fruits and vegetables rich in antioxidants, and supplementing with vitamin C. Those in the top third of antioxidant intake have half the risk of cognitive decline, according to a study of 2,716 people over age 60 (1). The home-test kit also measures antioxidant status, specifically glutathione levels.  Greens and beans are rich sources of the B vitamin folate. A recent study found that swapping one serving of processed meat for a serving of nuts or beans – foods high in folate – was associated with a 19% lower risk of dementia (2).

Getting your diet right is only half the story, says Holford. “Minimising alcohol, not smoking, staying physically active, and having a socially and intellectually stimulating lifestyle are all vital parts of dementia-proofing. So too are getting enough sleep, managing stress, and ensuring good hearing and vision. Cataracts, for example, increase risk, but having cataract surgery significantly lowers it. Women also need to support hormonal health after menopause. Often using ‘natural’ HRT makes a big difference.”

The book is out in the UK, EU today and you can pre-order for USA & Australia too (they will be shipped ot you in 3-5 weeks) .

Also join us in May for the Alzheimer’s Prevention Day

Food for the Brain is a not-for-profit educational and research charity that offers a free Cognitive Function Test and assesses your Dementia Risk Index to be able to advise you on how to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle.

By completing the Cognitive Function Test you are joining our grassroots research initiative to find out what really works for preventing cognitive decline. We share our ongoing research results with you to help you make brain-friendly choices.

Please support our research by becoming a Friend of Food for the Brain.

25 Daily Habits To Reduce Dementia Risk

by Patrick Holford

In this article, we’ll explore daily habits to reduce dementia risk and what simple lifestyle changes can have a big impact on long-term brain health.

Dementia, including Alzheimer’s is not only the greatest cause of death entailing huge healthcare costs, it is the major fear for many about aging. The great news is that dementia and Alzheimer’s are preventable. Less than 1% of Alzheimer’s is caused by genes so for most of us, the risk for dementia and age-related cognitive decline relates to things we can easily change. 

At foodforthebrain.org we have tested (for free) almost half a million people with a validated Cognitive Function Test, followed by a questionnaire which calculates your future Dementia Risk Index and crucially, advises what to do about it. 

Your risk is divided into eight wellness domains (see image), highlighting areas to focus on to enable brain and cognitive powers to stay intact. 

Here are 25 simple steps you can take to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle taken from our advice and my recent book, Upgrade Your Brain, which gives more detail for those who want to dig deeper.

Brain Fats – Up your brain fats – omega-3, phospholipids and vitamin D

1. Get your omega-3 index above 8%

You can measure your omega-3 index with a home test kit. Psychologists at the Linda Loma University in California did this for a group of older people, publishing their results in the journal Brain Sciences (1). They found that the higher a person’s omega-3 index was, the more white matter there was in their brain and the better they performed in cognitive tests. 
You can test your levels with a simple Omega-3 Index test or as part of the DRIFT 5-in-1 test.

2. Eat oily fish three times a week or SMASH it

S for salmon, M for mackerel, A for anchovies, S for sardines, and H for herrings or kippers. Caviar has the highest known levels of omega-3 DHA, which  builds your brain. Even having one serving a week almost halves the risk of Alzheimer’s. (2, 3). See the Best Fish for Brain table for a comparison of omega-3 levels, mercury content, and sustainability.

3. Supplement omega-3 fish oils

Aim for any supplement that provides 500mg of omega-3 DHA. This may mean two capsules a day. See this recent study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition of over 100,000 people (4). If you’re vegan, supplement with algal omega-3 DHA. 
Read more about omega-3 supplementation here.

4. Eat an egg and/or nuts and seeds every day 

Eating  two eggs a week halves future risk of Alzheimer’s (5). The best seeds are chia, flax, hemp and pumpkin. The best nuts are walnuts, pecans, and macadamia, but all nuts are a good source of protein and minerals.

5. Exercise outdoors and supplement vitamin D

Low blood levels of vitamin D make cognitive decline 19 times more likely. If your vitamin D level is high, Alzheimer’s disease is 4 times less likely. People who take vitamin D, which is especially important in winter, have a one-third lower risk. You can test your levels with a simple vitamin D test or as part of the DRIft 5-in-1 test.

Low Carb and GL – Eat a low-carb, low sugar, low GL diet

6. Avoid sugar and don’t eat junk food

Avoid the white stuff – flour, sugar, rice and especially ultra-processed foods. Fructose and high fructose corn syrup are common sweeteners. They are especially harmful to the brain. Read more about how sugar affects brain health in Is Sugar Killing Your Brain?.

7. Eat your fruit, don’t drink it

Stay away from fruit juices as they contain no fibre but lots of sugar. A glass of orange juice is worth three oranges’ worth of juice, but no fibre. Fibre fills you up. Learn more about the effects of fructose on health and the brain in this article on fructose.

8. Limit your intake of bread, pasta, and potatoes

If you eat more than 100 to 150 g a day of grains or potatoes, which is one or two servings max, your risk of dementia goes up .

9. Limit alcohol to a glass of wine a day or equivalent

Drinking alcohol, particularly red wine, can lower risk if done in moderation. However, the benefits are limited. . Abstinence increases risk, as does having more than 14 units of alcohol a week, according to a study in the British Medical Journal (6). Read more in The Truth About Alcohol and Your Brain

10. Add C8 oil to your coffee

The brain can run on either glucose or ketones, made in the liver from a ‘medium chain triglyceride’ called C8 oil. Two tablespoons of a C8-rich oil improve cognitive abilities and help provide the brain with energy (7).  Read more about MCT oil here.

B vitamins – Keep your homocysteine low with B vitamins 

11. Test your blood homocysteine level with a home test kit and supplement B vitamins if needed

A homocysteine level above 10 mmol/l, which is extremely common in people over 60, is strongly associated with accelerated brain shrinkage and increases risk of Alzheimer’s ten-fold. You can test your levels with at-home homocysteine test or as part of the DRIFT 5-in-1 test. Homocysteine is easily lowered by supplementing vitamin B6, B12 and folate but the amounts needed are much higher if your homocysteine level is high. Read more about lowering your homocysteine here.

12. Eat a serving a day of both greens and either beans, lentils, nuts or seeds

These are all high in the B vitamin folate as well as vitamin B6. A study in Holland gave 818 people aged 50 to 70 a folic acid supplement of 800mcg for three years, versus a placebo. At the end of the study, compared to those taking the placebo, those taking folic acid were functioning at the equivalent of being 5.5 years younger (8).

Antioxidants – Eat and drink anti-ageing antioxidants and polyphenols [4]

13. Eat lots of fresh fruit and veg

The more you eat, the better, though the benefits start to plateau at 500g a day, which is about five to six servings. People who ate the most greens had much less Alzheimer’s-related issues than those who ate the least.(9) . Berries are particularly protective, especially blueberries and strawberries. Read more about foods that help protect brain health in How to Keep Your Brain Young.

14. Drink Teash fruit and veg

The more you drink, the better as confirmed by a recent study from Singapore (8). However, other studies are conflicting (9). My view is to drink tea, green over black, in preference to coffee, and limit your intake to one or two cups a day.

15. Eat dark (70%+) chocolate

The benefit peaks at 10g, or about 3 pieces. More recent studies on cocoa, a rich source of flavanols, have shown improved cognition, possibly by improving circulation (11).

16. Supplement vitamins C and E – and don’t smoke!

A study of 4,740 elderly people in Utah found that those taking both vitamin E and C reduced their risk of developing Alzheimer’s by 23%.

Taking either cut risk by a quarter (12). Overall, a meta-analysis of vitamin C studies concludes thta supplementation lowers risk by about 26% (12). Smokers need at least twice as much vitamin C as non-smokers, just to have basic vitamin C levels in their blood. Smoking also raises homocysteine levels, another risk factor.

Learn more about Vitamin C and other antioxidants here.

Healthy Gut – A healthy gut is a healthy brain [5]

17. Eat plenty of soluble fibre and prebiotic foods

Fibre from foods like oats, chia, and flax seeds benefits our gut microbiome. Prebiotic foods like garlic, artichoke, leeks, and onions nourish and support healthy gut bacteria.

When you eat potatoes or rice, cook them ahead of time. Then, store them in the fridge. Reheating food increases the amount of prebiotics, also known as resistant starch.

Supplementing vitamin C helps promote lactobacillus and bifidobacteria.

Read more about gut health here.

Active Body – Exercise and keep physically active [6]

18. Get active for 20 minutes … and build and maintain muscle 

Spend at least 20 minutes doing activities such as walking, gardening, housework or repairing things – anything that gets you moving. Don’t limit yourself to ‘exercise’– anything that gives you a faster heart rate and engages different sets of muscles is good. Muscle mass best predicts both your brain volume and risk of cognitive decline in later years (13).

19. Get balancing!

The brain works hard in exercise, especially if it involves complex movements and learning, such as learning to dance, or doing different movements in a yoga or t’ai chi class or running or walking on uneven surfaces. The brain is processing a lot of information, triggering patterns of muscle movement and keeping you in balance.

For more on active body see Use It or Lose It. Why an Active Lifestyle is a Brain Essential

Active Mind – Keep yourself socially and intellectually active [7] 

20. Read, watch, or listen to stimulating content

A simple yardstick is to ask, ‘Am I learning anything? Am I using my mind?’ Reading books or listening to podcasts can be great ways to stimulate your mind, depending entirely on what you engage with.

21. Be social

Aim to spend at least two hours a week with other people in a social (not work) setting – groups, friends, family, etc.

22. Challenge your brain daily

Try challenging your brain with puzzles and word games such as Sudoku, crosswords or Wordle. You might also enjoy using a brain-training app. Two popular options with strong user ratings and research backing are BrainHQ and Lumosity, both designed to support memory, attention and processing speed.

23. Learn something new and challenging

Learning a new language, sport or musical instrument are all good – anything that you keep practising. This fascinating study looked at the brains of musicians and showed that amateur musicians benefited most (14).

Read more on hot to keep your mind active here.

Sleep and Calm – Sleep well, stay calm and live purposefully

24. Avoid alcohol before bed and limit any caffeine intake after midday 

Caffeine suppresses melatonin, which helps you sleep, for up to 10 hours. 

25. Aim to follow a soothing bedtime routine

Ensure your bedroom is quiet and dark and you are comfortable. Turn off mobile phones and Wi-Fi connections at night.  Prioritise relaxing activities in the few hours before you go to bed.

Read more about the powerful connection between sleep, stress and brain health in Sleep, Stress and the Brain, including why quality sleep is essential for memory, emotional resilience and long-term cognitive function.

So, while you do not need to implement all 25 things this week, think about what 2-3 things you could focus on this month.

For further support, monthly coaching and detailed personalised email guidance make sure you join us as a FRIEND so you get access to – your 6 month programme to help you upgrade your brain and improve your cognitive function. All for just £5 a month or £50 a year!

Food for the Brain is a not-for-profit educational and research charity that offers a free Cognitive Function Test and assesses your Dementia Risk Index to be able to advise you on how to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle.

By completing the Cognitive Function Test you are joining our grassroots research initiative to find out what really works for preventing cognitive decline. We share our ongoing research results with you to help you make brain-friendly choices.

Please support our research by becoming a Friend of Food for the Brain.

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This is the question we get asked all the time from our community.

Normally if they go to the doctor they may get referred to a memory clinic for a Cognitive Function Test. Some get invited to take part in drug trials and there are basically two kinds of drugs under investigation – anti-amyloid and anti-p-tau.  If you’re tempted to participate in any test, we would suggest finding out which type is being tested. So far the anti-amyloid treatments have not delivered any significant clinical benefit and lots of adverse effects including deaths. Anti p-tau drugs have not yet been proven to work. However, p-tau accumulation, making neurofibrillary tangles, is a function of high homocysteine which is lowered with B vitamins (see below).  We know this already. So why not test and lower homocysteine with B vitamins?

Some people get prescribed cholinesterase inhibitor drugs, designed to stop the breakdown of acetylcholine. These include rivastigmine, donepezil (Aricept) and galantamine. They are marginally effective, but the effect runs out after 2 years (see why below and other approaches).

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The first steps:

The first step, with help, is to do the Cognitive Function Test here (which they may struggle with), followed by a questionnaire.

Even if they can’t complete the Cognitive Function Test, do encourage them to continue and complete the questionnaire because this will show where the weak areas that need attention are. An example test result is below.

Ideally, they should then sign up as a FRIEND to get access to COGNITION and a focused brain upgrade but if they are too far progressed to receive and respond to emails, then here are some quick wins.

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At home tests to run & what to do with the results

First, have them do the DRIfT home test to measure HBA1c, homocysteine, omega-3 index and vitamin D. If you know their HbA1c and vitamin D already then you can test these individually (see all test options here).

From a raised HbA1c we’d know if sugar balance is a problem, in which case 2 tablespoons (60g) of C8 oil is likely to help, as well as eating low carbs and avoiding sugar as much as possible (and limit alcohol). The C8 oil helps the brain make ketones which is an alternative fuel source for brain cells and fills the ‘energy gap’ created by poor glucose delivery, a function of insulin resistance.

If Homocysteine is above 10mcmol/l. we’d know they need homocysteine lowering B vitamins (including supplementing vitamin B12 500mcg – see here)

If Omega-3 is below 8%, they need to eat more oily fish and supplement omega-3 fish oils with 500mg of DHA – see here for more info on supplementation. 

If Vitamin D is below 75nmol/l they need to supplement – probably 1,000 to 3,000ius a day or 10,000-20,000ius a week. Click here to read more about what’s needed depending on their level.

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How to support neuronal membranes

Neuronal membranes, which is what breaks down in dementia, are made from phospholipids binding to omega-3, which require B vitamins to drive a process called methylation.

If this process is not working efficiently, homocysteine goes up.

A critical phospholipid is Phosphatidyl Choline (PC), bound to omega-3 DHA (known as PC-DHA, which predicts dementia if low). The cholinesterase inhibitor drugs try to protect this but why not supplement phosphatidyl choline, which is very rich in lecithin capsules or granules? Two high PC lecithin capsules, plus at least 500 mg of omega-3 DHA, plus homocysteine-lowering B vitamin complexes cover all bases. See here for more information on supplements.

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Other things that can help

We can guide you through all 8 lifestyle domains that can help improve cognitive function in our COGNITION program (read how Dorothy got her husband back after implementing these with her husband here). 

A diet low in sugar and carbs, with lots of oily fish, regular exercise and as much social and intellectual stimulation as possible along with good sleep, all make a big difference and we guide you through that in COGNITION for £5 a month or £50 a year. Access COGNITION by joining as a FRIEND here.

Once the Cognitive Function Test is complete, you will get a personalised result showing the areas that are ‘in the green’ and the areas you need to focus on (bear in mind that if dementia is already diagnosed, there will probably be a lot of red and amber colours). 

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Actions:

Complete the Cognitive Function Test as much as possible, then if you wish join our COGNITION program for more guidance.
Order your DRIfT at home blood test here or if you already have some test results you can order single tests here

All tests ordered and completed contribute to our charitable work and independent research and are a part of our Citizen Science mission! 

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Thank you for reading!

Food for the Brain is a non-for-profit educational and research charity that offers a free Cognitive Function Test and assesses your Dementia Risk Index to be able to advise you on how to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle.

By completing the Cognitive Function Test you are joining our grassroots research initiative to find out what really works for preventing cognitive decline. We share our ongoing research results with you to help you make brain-friendly choices.

Please support our research by becoming a Friend of Food for the Brain.

Managing ADHD in Adults: A Nutritional Approach

ADHD isn’t only a childhood condition. A growing number of adults are being diagnosed with it, often for the first time, and medication alone doesn’t always address every symptom. That’s why adult ADHD nutrition is worth looking at alongside other approaches to managing symptoms

Struggling to focus, or the opposite problem, focusing so intensely on one thing that everything else in your life gets crowded out (hyperfocus), can cost you at work, in relationships and in day-to-day life.

We understand this well in children, and the impact it can have on learning and confidence. But what about adults who are only now realising their brain works differently to those around them? (If you’re here to support your child’s brain, our Smart Kids & Teens programme is the place to start.)

Diagnoses of neurodevelopmental conditions like ADHD and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have risen sharply in recent years. Both are classed as neurodivergent conditions, alongside others such as learning disabilities, anxiety disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorder and Tourette’s syndrome. 

That rise has been significant in both the UK and the US, and it raises a genuine question worth asking properly rather than assuming the answer: what’s changed? Genetics alone doesn’t explain a shift this fast, since our genes haven’t changed in a generation. So what has?

ADHD in adulthood

ADHD is not confined to childhood; many adults continue to experience its symptoms, which can significantly impact their personal and professional lives. Also, many parents discover this about themselves as they go through the process of getting their child diagnosed. 

Common symptoms of adult ADHD include:

Inattention: difficulty sustaining attention during tasks, making careless mistakes, not listening when spoken to directly, and being easily distracted (1,2).
Hyperfocus: paradoxically, some adults with ADHD can become intensely focused on tasks they find stimulating or rewarding, often to the exclusion of other activities (3).
Disorganisation: chronic issues with organising tasks and activities, often leading to missed deadlines and forgotten appointments (4).
Time management problems: struggling to manage time effectively, leading to procrastination and difficulty completing tasks (5).
Impulsivity: making hasty decisions without considering the long-term consequences, interrupting others, and difficulty waiting for their turn (6).
Emotional dysregulation: experiencing intense emotions, such as frustration or anger, and difficulty managing stress (7,8).

ADHD looks different in men and women

ADHD presents differently across men and women, which is a big part of why it’s underdiagnosed or misdiagnosed in women. Some key differences:

Brain development starts before birth

The brain you have as an adult began forming at conception, which is what makes maternal nutrition so important.

Alongside avoiding alcohol and smoking during pregnancy, a study of 11,875 pregnant women found a clear relationship between how much seafood a pregnant woman ate and her child’s development. The less seafood consumed, the worse the child’s social behaviour, fine motor skills, communication, social development and verbal IQ. (16)

A lack of vitamin A during pregnancy, another nutrient found in seafood, can affect brain development and lead to long-term or even permanent impairment in learning, memory formation and cognitive function. (17)

Then there’s folate, or vitamin B9, another nutrient with a fundamental role in brain development and methylation. Folic acid is the synthetic form of folate commonly used in supplements and food fortification. A mother’s folate intake predicts her child’s performance in cognitive tests at nine to ten years old (18), and the higher a baby’s B-vitamin status, the higher their cognitive function at 25. (19) Supplementing mothers-to-be with folic acid (400mcg/day) during the second and third trimesters is associated with better cognition in their children at three, and better word reasoning and IQ (verbal and performance) at seven. (20)

What about folinic acid? Folinic acid is a reduced form of folate that bypasses some of the metabolic steps needed to process folic acid. The evidence for folinic acid specifically comes mainly from autism spectrum disorder rather than ADHD. A randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial in 48 children with autism and language impairment found that high-dose folinic acid (2mg/kg daily, up to 50mg) significantly improved verbal communication over 12 weeks, with the strongest effect in children who tested positive for folate receptor autoantibodies, a marker associated with impaired folate transport into the brain. (43)

This is quite different from the broader evidence around folate and brain development. It suggests that folinic acid may have particular relevance where folate transport into the brain is impaired, but these high doses are not something to self-supplement

Nothing builds properly in the brain without healthy methylation, and methylation requires folate, reflected in a low homocysteine level. Raised homocysteine is a well-known predictor of miscarriage and pregnancy problems, which is why it can be suggested that no woman attempts pregnancy until her homocysteine level is below 7 mcmol/l.

A homocysteine level above 11 means increased brain shrinkage. Even a level above 9 during pregnancy predicts more problems for the child at six: withdrawn behaviour, anxiety, depression, social problems and aggressive behaviour. (21)

So it’s worth looking back at your own childhood development to understand your adult brain. How well nourished was it? Did you get adequate folate, vitamin A and enough seafood as a child?

Providing all brain-dependent nutrients at an optimal level now, as an adult, may still help recover some of that deficit. That’s the premise worth testing for yourself.

Adult ADHD nutrition: essential nutrients for brain health

The brain needs nourishment at every age, but for adults with ADHD, what are the nutrients to focus on and ensure are abundantly available in your diet?

Most nutrition research in ADHD has been carried out in children rather than adults, although these nutrients remain important for brain function throughout life.

Vitamin A

Vitamin A is important for brain development, with deficiency potentially leading to long-term impairment in learning, memory formation and cognitive function. (17)

Vitamin D

Low vitamin D levels in childhood are linked to behavioural problems in adolescence, while low levels later in life have also been associated with a higher risk of cognitive decline and dementia. (25, 26, 27, 28).

If you are unsure about your vitamin D status, a vitamin D blood test can provide a clearer picture of your current level.

Chromium, copper, zinc and magnesium

Children with ADHD tend to have lower levels of zinc, chromium and magnesium, and sometimes copper (29). One study found a higher copper-to-zinc ratio in neurodivergent children than in neurotypical children, which was associated with the severity of ADHD symptoms (30). Zinc supplementation has been reported to improve aspects of attention in children with ADHD (31), while magnesium deficiency appears to be more common in ADHD and supplementation has been associated with reduced hyperactivity in some studies (32). However, the evidence is predominantly in children, and this does not mean that supplementing these minerals will necessarily improve ADHD symptoms in adults.

Read more about how magnesium plays an important role in brain function and may influence attention, mood, sleep and the body’s response to stress.

Omega-3

The omega-3 fats EPA and DHA are important components of brain cell membranes and support normal brain function. A 2023 meta-analysis of 22 randomised controlled trials involving 1,789 people with ADHD found that when omega-3 was supplemented for at least four months, there was a significant improvement in core ADHD symptoms compared with placebo. (33) Read more about omega-3 fats for brain health.

B vitamins

Folate works alongside other B vitamins in processes essential for brain function, including methylation and neurotransmitter production. In a study of 264 young adults, it was observed that lower levels of vitamins B2, B6 and folate (B9) were associated with ADHD, while lower B2 and B6 levels were also linked to greater symptom severity. (47) Together with the important role of B12 and folate in methylation and homocysteine metabolism, this makes maintaining a good supply of B vitamins an important part of supporting brain health.

How eating more fish and seafood supports your brain

Supplements can be useful for correcting deficiencies or achieving therapeutic amounts of particular nutrients, but food matters too. Fish and seafood are among the richest sources of brain-building nutrients, particularly the omega-3 fats EPA and DHA, as well as iodine, selenium, vitamin B12 and protein.

Lower DHA concentrations are associated with poorer reading ability, poorer memory, oppositional behaviour and emotional instability. (22)
Several studies have shown increased aggression in those with low omega-3 DHA and EPA, and giving more omega-3 fats reduces aggression.(23)
A study of 541 Chinese schoolchildren found fish consumption predicted sleep quality, and that those who ate the most fish had the highest IQ, 4.8 points higher than those who ate none., with the sleep-quality improvement itself linked to the IQ gain. (24)

Neurodivergent or nutrient deficient?

The table below lists the most common characteristics of autistic spectrum disorder, as set out by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Alongside each, we’ve added the nutrient deficiencies that research has shown can produce the same symptom.

A note on MSG: most of the evidence linking MSG to ADHD-like behaviour comes from animal studies, and even there it’s a genuinely mixed picture: some rodent studies find MSG exposure during development produces ADHD-like behaviours when combined with poor nutrition, while others find MSG actually reduces aggression via effects on the vagus nerve. A comprehensive 2019 safety review of MSG in humans found the evidence for it causing neurobehavioural harm at normal dietary doses is not well established (45). That’s a different evidence picture from artificial colours and the preservative sodium benzoate, where a large, well-conducted human trial has shown a real effect on children’s hyperactive behaviour. Keep MSG in mind as one marker of a heavily processed diet generally, rather than a proven cause of hyperactivity in its own right.

Sugar, blood sugar and the brain

The amount of sugar you eat has as much impact on your brain as any single nutrient does.

Too many refined carbohydrates and ultra-processed foods, and too much sugar, are bad for anyone at any age. They’re linked to ADHD (33) and autism symptoms in children, to adult anxiety and depression, (34) and strongly linked to a higher risk of age-related cognitive decline, dementia and Alzheimer’s.

This starts earlier than you’d think: the glycemic load of a mother’s diet during pregnancy predicts a four-fold risk of anxiety in toddlers, five times more impulsivity in boys, four times as many sleeping problems, and, in girls in the top third for glycemic load, 15 times the likelihood of anxiety. (35)

Reduce your sugar intake is one of the highest-leverage changes available to you, at any age.

The four drivers of ADHD

When it comes to adult ADHD nutrition, there are several dietary factors worth paying attention to.

Multi-nutrient trials have shown improvements in irritability, hyperactivity and self-harm in children with ADHD.(39) Raised homocysteine and low B12 or folate are associated with a greater risk of developing ASD and with worse symptoms, through the methylation abnormalities they create. Supplementing homocysteine-lowering B vitamins improves symptoms. (40, 41, 42)

In summary, ADHD can be made worse, or contributed to, by:

A high-GL diet, with too much sugar
A lack of essential omega-3 fats
A lack of critical nutrients such as B vitamins, zinc and magnesium
Unidentified food intolerances (read more about how food intolerance can impact the brain)

What you can do?

ADHD

Thank you for reading!

Food for the Brain is a non-for-profit educational and research charity that offers a free Cognitive Function Test and assesses your Dementia Risk Index to be able to advise you on how to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle.

By completing the Cognitive Function Test you are joining our grassroots research initiative to find out what really works for preventing cognitive decline. We share our ongoing research results with you to help you make brain-friendly choices.

Please support our research by becoming a Friend of Food for the Brain.

Written by Jerome Burne, see the original article at the Daily Mail here. Find out about Jerome here.

It is over 20 years since I discovered in my fifties that I have a copy of the gene, ApoE4, that’s been linked to a raised risk of Alzheimer’s.

—

It is over 20 years since I discovered in my fifties that I have a copy of the gene, ApoE4,that’s been linked to a raised risk of Alzheimer’s.

It’s the same gene that the actor Chris Hemsworth carries, although he has two copies, one from each of his parents – he learned this in 2022 after having tests for a documentary series he was making about longevity.

Now comes news of a major study that’s found that almost everyone who has two copies of this gene goes on to develop early signs of Alzheimer’s – researchers at the Sant Pau Research Institute in Barcelona looked at data from 10,000 people and 3,000 brain donors and found that the majority of those with two copies showed signs of Alzheimer’s by the time they reached the age of 55. The researchers estimate that around 2 percent of people have this gene profile.

My ApoE4 gene was identified when I was writing about the gene tests then just becoming publicly available, and as a health journalist I took one. It was an alarming discovery, since not only do I have no family history of Alzheimer’s, but back then there was nothing to be done about it, and for a while,  common moments such as forgetting why I was peering into the fridge or a cupboard felt like a sinister warning. 

But I quickly persuaded myself that any brain malfunction wouldn’t begin for years.

Anyway, a cure might come along any time and as a health journalist I could keep up with the latest research. 

Yet for years there was little to be hopeful about – the few drugs that were available didn’t make a difference to the disease progression.

Small bits of cutting-edge research I came across here and there convinced me to try various lifestyle approaches (more on the specifics later), but the expectation has long been that once you’re heading into the medical territory that is Alzheimer’s, you need heavyweight
pharmaceuticals.

But the cheering, and very surprising news, is that nutritional and lifestyle advice, with some additions and tweaks, is the very latest thing in Alzheimer’s prevention, with several UK charities and academic centres – including Imperial College, London, Exeter University, and Alzheimer’s Research UK – now actively investigating lifestyle.

What’s driving this dramatic U-turn is the failure of the drug industry to come up with effective and safe products. Even the newer ‘wonder’ drugs such as donanemab and lecanemab, which can delay the worsening of the disease by around a third in patients, can have serious side-effects – around a quarter of those who take them suffer bleeding or swelling in the brain, and some patients have experienced brain shrinkage. 

These drugs work by clearing the brain of amyloid plaques – the sticky protein deposits thought to cause symptoms by disrupting communication between brain cells.

The problems with the latest drugs are detailed in a new book by leading neurologist Professor Karl Herrup, of Philadelphia University. In ‘How not to study a disease: The story of Alzheimer’s’ he writes: ‘In our rush to find a cure we have gone down a blind alley. For decades we have focused more on salesmanship than scholarship. The amyloid cascade hypothesis has become a steamroller, intent on crushing any alternative models.’

One problem is that having the plaque doesn’t necessarily mean you will have Alzheimer’s and not having it doesn’t mean you won’t.

As Professor Herrup points out, ‘we need to rebalance this amyloid hypothesis about the cause of Alzheimer’s to include other worthy ideas about its nature, such as those indicated by the links with diabetes and blood vessel damage and the insights gained from approaches involving diet, nutrition, and lifestyle’.

What’s so radical about the nutritional and lifestyle approach is that it doesn’t target a single
cause but aims to improve the health of many of the body’s systems – such as metabolism (how energy is used), the immune system and the vast colony of bacteria and other microbes (the microbiome) in your guts, that have a two-way connection with the brain.  Keeping them all healthy can do the same for the brain.  

And it means we can all take steps to protect themselves, which is what I’ve tried to do. 

I spoke to Tommy Woods, an Assistant Professor of neuroscience and paediatrics at the University of Washington, who is a principal investigator for the research charity, the Food for the Brain Foundation, which is looking at dementia amongst other brain disorders. The charity offers a free online test to both measure your cognitive function but also a questionnaire that works out your dementia risk. I did the test and it showed me exactly what, in my diet and lifestyle, was driving my risk.

He told me: ‘I first came across the idea of multiple approaches to health and fitness when I worked with athletes as a performance consultant. Many of the systems that affected their cognitive and physical abilities were the same as the ones we concentrate on at the charity with much older people.’

Robert Lustig, who is professor emeritus and an international expert on metabolism, based at the University of California San Francisco, explains why both blood sugar levels and insulin need to be kept at a low level to protect the brain.

Insulin’s job is to help the body use blood sugar (glucose) as fuel to clear it away into storage as fat. Professor Lustig, who is also advising the Food for Brain Foundation, says high levels of glucose – from a high carb diet – lead to higher levels of insulin. ‘Fairly soon, however, your system stops responding to insulin – known as insulin resistance – which is bad news because insulin delivers the glucose needed for energy in the brain and muscles.’

This is the kind of information that convinced me over the years to make changes to my diet.

The standard advice to have plenty of carbs and pick the low-fat option was reversed, and I started following a ketogenic diet that involves eating much more fat, mostly saturated and is very low in carbs.

The fat gets turned into small packets of energy, known as ketones, that can power brain cells.

I also started stepping up gym visits from a couple of times a week, to three or four. Exercise improves blood circulation which is needed to clear waste products from the brain.

I started paying attention to my microbiome – the colony of microbes that lives in the gut. This involved eating more fibrous vegetables, as well as making and drinking kefir – a fermented drink that delivers probiotics to the guts, every day.

And I started taking B vitamins.

A decade after my gene was spotted, a randomised trial at Oxford University, run by Professor Emeritus David Smith, showed that B vitamins were essential for clearing a toxic compound called homocysteine from blood.

Homocysteine comes from the breakdown of proteins, and can damage cells. High levels often found in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients.

In the Oxford study, which involved over 200 people with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) – where memory and clear thinking are impaired – half were given a daily high dose of a B vitamin, the rest a placebo. A proportion of each group had a brain scan at the beginning end of the two-year trial.

The results, published in the journal PLOS One in September 2010, were impressive: those in the vitamin group not only had reduced homocysteine levels but brain shrinkage – the sign brain cell death – was half that of those in the placebo group.

Rather than being welcomed, however, the trial set off a long running academic battle. Alzheimer’s charities, including one that contributed funding, ignored it. 

Another study which found no benefit from B vitamins was published four years later, but it didn’t convince me. While the participants in the Oxford trial had mild cognitive impairment, those in the later trials did not. So I kept taking the tablets.

One senior academic who has picked up on this research is Professor Peter Garrard, a specialist in neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, at St George’s Hospital in London. 

When his mother Sheila started losing words and describing things in roundabout ways at the age of 78, he put her on a daily dose of high strength B vitamins. 

‘It was very encouraging that despite having had a brain scan that showed significant cell damage, she didn’t get any worse and then gradually started doing a lot better,’ says Professor Garrard. Sheila died at the age of 89. ‘We’ll never know how long she would have lived without the vitamins, but it must have made a difference that she stayed very fit and active.’

Professor Garrard told me that he’d been impressed by the B vitamin research done at Oxford and regarded claims that the vitamins had no benefit inaccurate. ‘I check all my patient’s homocysteine levels and give them B vitamins if they are over the healthy level,’ he says.

Evidence for the benefit of B vitamins continued to mount, including in 2020, a review published by Professor Jin-Tai Yu from Fudan University in Shanghai, China’s leading Alzheimer’s prevention expert. Published in Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry, this analysed the results of 153 randomised trials and concluded that:  ‘Homocysteine-lowering treatment seems the most promising intervention for Alzheimer’s disease prevention. ’ (The homocysteine-lowering treatment reviewed involved using folic acid (B9), vitamin B12 and vitamin B6).
 
As for me, I’m sanguine about the latest research about the ApoE4 gene: I’m currently feeling fit and well, thanks to a programme that seems a sensible way to stave off physical decline in general, and neurological decline in particular.

For more information and to reduce your risk you can:

Take the FREE Cognitive Function Test here
Order your at-home blood tests here
Support our research and become a FRIEND here
Participate in Alzheimer’s Prevention Day

Thank you for reading!

Food for the Brain is a non-for-profit educational and research charity that offers a free Cognitive Function Test and assesses your Dementia Risk Index to be able to advise you on how to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle.

By completing the Cognitive Function Test you are joining our grassroots research initiative to find out what really works for preventing cognitive decline. We share our ongoing research results with you to help you make brain-friendly choices.

Please support our research by becoming a Friend of Food for the Brain.

Boosting GABA: Natural Support for Anxiety and Low Mood This Winter

By Patrick Holford

Boost gaba naturally this winter. For many people, the darker months are when anxiety creeps up and mood dips. Shorter days, colder weather and more indoor time often leave the nervous system running on empty. Yet winter does not have to feel this way. Once you understand what is happening in your brain, you can support it with simple, effective tools that help you stay calm, steady and more resilient.

Why alcohol and cannabis feel calming: the GABA effect

How these substances create short term calm

When anxiety builds, many people instinctively reach for something to take the edge off. In one ordinary week in the UK, around 10 million tranquilliser pills are taken, 10 million cannabis joints are smoked and 120 million alcoholic drinks are consumed.

These substances all act on the same calming messenger in the brain: GABA, short for gamma aminobutyric acid. GABA is your neurological dimmer switch. It helps turn down adrenaline, settles the nervous system and makes you feel relaxed and more sociable. A drink or a joint can temporarily boost GABA and give you that familiar sense of relief.

Why the calming effect backfires

The problem comes shortly afterwards. GABA rises, then dips. Once levels fall, irritability, low mood and cravings follow, pushing people towards another drink or smoke. Alcohol also disrupts dreaming sleep which is essential for mental rejuvenation. The result is that you wake tired, flat and anxious with GABA still suppressed and the body working hard to detoxify last night’s alcohol.

Over time, alcohol raises anxiety rather than reducing it. Cannabis, used habitually, tends to lower drive and motivation while offering the same short-lived GABA response.

The good news is that you can support your GABA system in ways that build resilience rather than deplete it.

Natural ways to boost GABA and restore calm

GABA and taurine supplements

GABA is both a neurotransmitter and an amino acid. Supplementing it can help support healthy GABA activity in the brain, offering a gentle, natural way to unwind. In the UK it is regulated as a medicine so you cannot purchase it, though it remains easily available online in other countries. Several natural calming formulas include taurine and glutamine which help the body boost GABA production.

If using GABA directly, most people benefit from 250 to 500 mg once or twice a day. It is not addictive. Higher doses can cause nausea, vomiting or a rise in blood pressure, especially above 3 g a day. Taken in the evening it can also support sleep.

Taurine is structurally and functionally similar to GABA and helps settle the stress response. Despite its inclusion in energy drinks, taurine is not a stimulant. Research shows taurine supplementation slows key markers of ageing (2). It is richest in animal foods, so vegetarians may be more prone to low levels. A typical supportive dose is 500 to 1,000 mg twice daily.

B vitamins and vitamin C for steadier mood

Several B vitamins, especially vitamin B6, are tightly linked to how efficiently your body produces GABA. A recent trial found that 100 mg of B6 reduced self-reported anxiety (3). A large-scale study found women with higher vitamin B6 intake had lower depression and anxiety risk (4). Combined B vitamins also correlate with lower levels of both stress and mood disorders (5). 

B6 is part of the same biochemical pathway that keeps homocysteine in check. When homocysteine rises, methylation slows and the brain becomes more vulnerable to low mood and anxiety. Keeping this pathway supported can make a meaningful difference. If you are curious about your levels, homocysteine is included in the DRIfT test.

Another review concluded that B6, magnesium and essential fatty acids can reduce anxiety and blood pressure responses to stress, particularly in women (6).

Vitamin C also plays an important role in stress resilience. It sits alongside cortisol in the adrenal cortex and rises in the bloodstream during stress. Since humans, unlike most animals, do not produce vitamin C internally, low intake can heighten vulnerability to stress. Several trials show vitamin C supplementation reduces anxiety and boosts mental vitality (7, 8). Earlier work from the 1970s showed that intakes above 400 mg reduced fatigue (9).

Calming herbs: valerian, hops and passionflower

Valerian (Valeriana officinalis) is a well-established natural relaxant used for restlessness, nervousness and insomnia. It enhances GABA receptor activity and can help boost GABA in a gentle way that supports deeper relaxation. Typical amounts are 50 to 100 mg twice daily, with double that amount before bed if sleeplessness is an issue. Valerian should not be combined with sedative medication or alcohol and not taken without medical guidance.

Hops (Humulus lupulus) has been used historically for sleep and nervous tension. It acts directly on the central nervous system and is most effective when combined with valerian or passionflower.

Passionflower (Passiflora incarnata) offers gentle calming support, promotes sleep and has no known side effects at normal doses. Around 100 to 200 mg a day is typical. It is also thought to be useful for children who struggle to settle. For those who want to avoid excessive drowsiness, hops and passionflower used without valerian may be preferable.

Magnesium to relax body and mind and to help boost GABA pathways

Magnesium supports muscle relaxation, nerve function and mood. Diets high in sugar, refined foods, calcium rich dairy, caffeine and alcohol may lead to depleted magnesium status. Too much calcium relative to magnesium can contribute to muscle tension, nervousness, insomnia and irregular heartbeat.

Magnesium also helps stabilise blood sugar and works alongside B6 and zinc in stress regulation. Several trials show that magnesium, especially combined with B6, reduces anxiety and depression within weeks (10, 11).

Most people would benefit from around 300 mg from supplements, alongside a diet rich in vegetables, nuts, seeds and whole foods. Seeds, nuts, beans and leafy greens provide very good levels.

Theanine: why tea feels calming

Tea delivers caffeine but never feels as jittery as coffee. That is because tea naturally contains L-theanine, an amino acid that increases alpha wave activity associated with relaxed alertness (13). Around 50 mg can noticeably shift the nervous system into a calmer state. Supplements that combine theanine with GABA can can boost gaba effects even further (14).

Balance blood sugar to reduce anxiety physiology

Alongside supporting neurotransmitters like GABA, keeping blood sugar steady is one of the simplest ways to reduce anxiety. When glucose drops, the body releases adrenaline and cortisol to raise it again, which can create sudden waves of anxiety, shakiness and irritability. Research shows that unstable glucose control increases stress reactivity and mood volatility, while balanced meals with protein, fibre and lower GL carbohydrates help stabilise both blood sugar and mood (15). This is particularly relevant in winter, when comfort eating, irregular routines and higher sugar intake are more common.

Support omega 3 levels for calmer mood and boost GABA function

Another key factor underpinning calmness is omega-3 status. EPA and DHA play an essential role in how flexible and responsive brain cell membranes are, which directly affects how well GABA and serotonin receptors function. Keeping omega three levels optimal helps the brain boost GABA signalling more effectively.

Several clinical studies show omega-3 supplementation can lower symptoms of anxiety and improve overall mood stability, especially in those with low baseline levels (16). Since omega-3 cannot be produced in meaningful amounts by the body, keeping levels optimal makes a measurable difference to stress resilience.

If you are unsure of your status,  then order your DRIfT blood test to find out  – available globally.

Top up vitamin D for winter mood resilience

Winter is also the time when vitamin D levels typically fall, and low vitamin D has repeatedly been linked with lower mood, poorer stress tolerance and greater anxiety. A large meta analysis found that adults with low vitamin D were significantly more likely to experience depression, and supplementation helped improve mood in those who were deficient (17). Vitamin D also influences serotonin production and inflammation, two pathways that strongly affect how the brain responds to stress. Checking levels during winter and supplementing if needed is a simple step with meaningful impact.

A notes on panic attacks, lactic acid and the breath

Panic attacks can be terrifying, with palpitations, rapid breathing and a sense of impending doom. While psychological factors play a role, there can be a biochemical layer too. High levels of lactic acid can drive symptoms. When breathing becomes fast and shallow, carbon dioxide drops and lactic acid rises, which can quickly trigger an anxiety surge.

Breathing slowly into a paper bag or through cupped hands can help restore balance by raising carbon dioxide and reducing lactic acid. Keeping blood sugar stable by eating regularly also helps prevent abrupt dips that can trigger hyperventilation.

A systems based approach to boost GABA and reduce anxiety

Anxiety rarely comes from one place. Biology, psychology, sleep, nutrients, hormones, blood sugar and daily habits all interact, which is why a systems based approach often works best. Supporting several of these pathways at once helps the nervous system become steadier and more resilient, especially in winter when stress loads tend to rise. When you strengthen blood sugar balance, reduce stimulants, restore nutrient status, improve sleep and use targeted herbs, you naturally boost GABA and shift the whole stress response.

Next steps:

Read more about sugar and brain health here.
Take the free Cognitive Function Test to understand your personal profile.
Explore the DRIfT test to join our research and check key nutritional and metabolic markers linked to mood and cognitive health.

Food for the Brain is a non-for-profit educational and research charity that offers a free Cognitive Function Test and assesses your Dementia Risk Index to be able to advise you on how to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle.

By completing the Cognitive Function Test you are joining our grassroots research initiative to find out what really works for preventing cognitive decline. We share our ongoing research results with you to help you make brain-friendly choices.

Please support our research by becoming a Friend of Food for the Brain.

References

2 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abn9257

3 Field DT, Cracknell RO, Eastwood JR, Scarfe P, Williams CM, Zheng Y, Tavassoli T. High-dose Vitamin B6 supplementation reduces anxiety and strengthens visual surround suppression. Hum Psychopharmacol. 2022 Nov;37(6):e2852. doi: 10.1002/hup.2852. Epub 2022 Jul 19. PMID: 35851507; PMCID: PMC9787829.

4 Kafeshani M, Feizi A, Esmaillzadeh A, Keshteli AH, Afshar H, Roohafza H, Adibi P. Higher vitamin B6 intake is associated with lower depression and anxiety risk in women but not in men: A large cross-sectional study. Int J Vitam Nutr Res. 2020 Oct;90(5-6):484-492. doi: 10.1024/0300-9831/a000589. Epub 2019 Jun 11. PMID: 31188081.

5 Mahdavifar B, Hosseinzadeh M, Salehi-Abargouei A, Mirzaei M, Vafa M. Dietary intake of B vitamins and their association with depression, anxiety, and stress symptoms: A cross-sectional, population-based survey. J Affect Disord. 2021 Jun 1;288:92-98. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2021.03.055. Epub 2021 Mar 26. PMID: 33848753.

6 McCabe D, Lisy K, Lockwood C, Colbeck M. The impact of essential fatty acid, B vitamins, vitamin C, magnesium and zinc supplementation on stress levels in women: a systematic review. JBI Database System Rev Implement Rep. 2017 Feb;15(2):402-453. doi: 10.11124/JBISRIR-2016-002965. PMID: 28178022.

7 de Oliveira IJ, de Souza VV, Motta V, Da-Silva SL. Effects of Oral Vitamin C Supplementation on Anxiety in Students: A Double-Blind, Randomized, Placebo-Controlled Trial. Pak J Biol Sci. 2015 Jan;18(1):11-8. doi: 10.3923/pjbs.2015.11.18. PMID: 26353411.

8 Sim M, Hong S, Jung S, Kim JS, Goo YT, Chun WY, Shin DM. Vitamin C supplementation promotes mental vitality in healthy young adults: results from a cross-sectional analysis and a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. Eur J Nutr. 2022 Feb;61(1):447-459. doi: 10.1007/s00394-021-02656-3. Epub 2021 Sep 2. PMID: 34476568; PMCID: PMC8783887.

9 E. Cheraskin et al., ‘Daily vitamin consumption and fatigability’, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society (1976), vol 24(3), pp. 136–137. 

10 Noah L, Dye L, Bois De Fer B, Mazur A, Pickering G, Pouteau E. Effect of magnesium and vitamin B6 supplementation on mental health and quality of life in stressed healthy adults: Post-hoc analysis of a randomised controlled trial. Stress Health. 2021 Dec;37(5):1000-1009. doi: 10.1002/smi.3051. Epub 2021 May 6. PMID: 33864354; PMCID: PMC9292249.

11 Tarleton EK, Littenberg B, MacLean CD, Kennedy AG, Daley C. Role of magnesium supplementation in the treatment of depression: A randomized clinical trial. PLoS One. 2017 Jun 27;12(6):e0180067. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0180067. PMID: 28654669; PMCID: PMC5487054.

12 Hindmarch I et al, Psychopharmacology, 1998; see also Hindmarch I et al, Psychopharmacology, 2000

13 Nobre AC et al., a report to Unilever by the Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, 2003; see also Unno K et al, Pharmacol Biochem Behav, 2013

14 Lyon et al, Altern Med Rev, 2011

15 Benton D, Donohoe RT. The effects of nutrients on mood. Public Health Nutr. 1999 Dec;2(3A):403–9.

16 Su KP, Matsuoka Y, Pae CU. Omega 3 fatty acids in mood disorders. J Clin Psychiatry. 2003;64 Suppl 2:32–7.

17 Anglin RE, Samaan Z, Walter SD, McDonald SD. Vitamin D deficiency and depression in adults: systematic review and meta analysis. Br J Psychiatry. 2013 Feb;202:100–7.

Can You Recover Your Memory and Rebuild Brain Health?

Author: Kezia Hall · First published: 30/11/2023 · Last reviewed: 08/10/2026

You walk into a room and forget why. A familiar name sits on the tip of your tongue and won’t come out. Changes like these can feel worrying, especially if dementia has touched your family. But the good news is that your brain keeps rewiring itself throughout life, and many of the things that wear memory down are within your control. 

How much you can recover depends on what’s driving the change. Whether you want to stop your memory getting worse or sharpen it, you need three things:

Structure: the nutrients your brain uses to build and maintain brain cells and their connections
Function: a reliable fuel supply
Utilisation: an active physical, social and intellectual life

Think of it as servicing a car. Structure is the bodywork, function is the fuel, and utilisation is actually taking it out on the road.

Can You Recover Your Memory?

Often, yes. It depends on the cause. Memory problems linked to poor sleep, low mood, stress, side effects of some medicines, or a deficiency such as low vitamin B12 or an underactive thyroid often improve once the cause is put right. Depression is the most common of these.[1] That’s why doctors are advised to rule out reversible causes before anything else.[2] If memory decline turns out to be part of a progressive condition such as Alzheimer’s, fully reversible cases are rare. One review of memory-clinic studies found potentially reversible causes in about 9% of people, but only around 0.6% actually recovered.[3] There, the aim is to slow decline and protect the brain function you still have, and that’s why prevention matters so much. The earlier you start, the more there is to protect.

Your brain keeps forming and strengthening connections at every age, a capacity called neuroplasticity. Better nutrition, regular activity, good sleep and a busy mind give it what it needs to adapt.

If your memory changes are persistent, getting worse or have no obvious explanation, see your GP first to rule out medical causes.

Can Brain Cells Recover?

Here it pays to be precise. Brain cells (neurons) that have died aren’t replaced the way skin cells are. Scientists still disagree about whether adults keep growing new neurons in the hippocampus, the brain’s memory hub. One major study found little evidence of it,[4] while another found thousands of new neurons even in people in their eighties.[5]

What isn’t in doubt is that your brain can rewire itself. Surviving neurons grow new branches and form new connections, and the ones you use get stronger. Brain regions can even grow. In one trial, a year of brisk walking enlarged the hippocampus of older adults by about 2% and improved their memory. The comparison group lost volume, as you’d expect with age.[6]

So rebuilding your brain doesn’t mean regrowing damaged tissue. It means protecting the brain cells you have, giving them the raw materials to keep their connections in good repair, and using them enough that those connections stay. For the nutrients your brain uses to build its cells, read how to keep building brain cells at any age.

What Causes Memory and Brain Function to Decline?

Memory is very subjective. One person’s sense of how good their memory is can be very different from the next person’s. Many people later in life are convinced their memory is slipping. Others choose the path of denial, even when it’s becoming obvious to those around them.

Real decline is rarely down to one thing. It’s usually several factors adding up, most of which you can change:

Poor building materials: too little omega-3 and too few B vitamins, which shows up as raised homocysteine

An unreliable fuel supply: years of consuming too much sugar and refined carbohydrate can contribute to insulin resistance and make it harder for the brain to use glucose efficiently (see how the brain gets its fuel).

Oxidative stress: wear and tear from free radicals outpacing your brain’s antioxidant defences

Low vitamin D

Inactivity: physical, mental and social

Poor sleep and chronic stress

Age and genes matter, but they set your starting point, not your destination. These are the same drivers that push up Alzheimer’s risk, which is why how to Alzheimer’s-proof yourself reads so much like the advice here. For the bigger picture, see our systems-based approach to brain health and the 8 domains of brain health. If your main problem is foggy thinking rather than forgetting, start with how to clear brain fog.

The good news is that the parts of cognition that decline on the road to dementia can be measured objectively, decades before any diagnosis. That gives you time to course-correct while there’s plenty of road ahead.

How Is Your Memory Performing?

The free, validated online Cognitive Function Test™ takes about 15-20 minutes. It measures three key areas of cognitive function: episodic memory, attention and executive function, helping to identify signs of cognitive decline and potential cognitive impairment. Afterwards, a short questionnaire shows you which parts of your diet and lifestyle need attention. You’ll need a tablet or computer, not a phone. It isn’t a diagnosis. It’s your road map.

Take the Free Cognitive Function Test

How to Support Memory and Rebuild Brain Health

1. Structure: Give Your Brain the Nutrients It Needs

B Vitamins, Omega-3 and Memory

B vitamins and omega-3 fats are a dynamic duo. Each works best when the other is in good supply.

Homocysteine is an amino acid. Your body uses the B vitamins B6, B12 and folate to break it down. When you’re short of B vitamins, homocysteine builds up, and raised homocysteine is linked to faster brain shrinkage.

Omega-3 fats, especially DHA, are built into the membranes of your brain cells. They keep those membranes fluid and help neurotransmitters, your brain’s chemical couriers, do their job.

The Oxford VITACOG trial gave homocysteine-lowering B vitamins to people with mild cognitive impairment. Their brains shrank more slowly than those of people taking a placebo, and the effect was greatest in people who started with high homocysteine.[7]

Then came the twist. The benefit depended on omega-3.Among people with good omega-3 levels, B vitamins slowed brain shrinkage by 40% compared with placebo. The effect was even more striking in those who also had raised homocysteine levels at the start, with brain shrinkage slowing by an impressive 73%. By contrast, B vitamins made no significant difference in people with low omega-3 levels.8

It works the other way round too. In the Swedish OmegAD trial, people with mild to moderate Alzheimer’s took 2.3g of omega-3 a day. Those who already had good B vitamin status (low homocysteine) did better on memory and clinical measures than those on placebo.[9]

For the full brain-shrinkage story, read omega-3 and B vitamins: nutrients that may slow brain shrinkage. For your memory, here’s what to do:

Get your Omega-3 Index above 8%. Eat oily fish three times a week, or take fish oil capsules. Here’s how much omega-3 you need and what to look for in a supplement.

Keep your homocysteine below 7 µmol/L. If it’s higher, take a broad-spectrum formula containing B12, folate, B6, TMG, zinc and NAC. Find out more about how B vitamins lower homocysteine, and try these 8 natural ways to lower homocysteine.

Up Your Antioxidants

The next stop on the brain upgrade road trip is to fill up on antioxidants. Think of them as your brain’s fuel filter, mopping up the free radicals that energy production leaves behind. Two key players are glutathione and melatonin.

Your body makes glutathione from NAC (N-acetyl cysteine), which belongs in your homocysteine-lowering formula. Glutathione is also recycled by anthocyanins, the pigments in blue and red foods such as blueberries. Spinach and dark chocolate help too, and onions, asparagus and eggs supply its building blocks.

Eat a serving of berries every day.

Read more in how to keep your brain young with antioxidants.

Melatonin is best known as the sleep hormone, but it’s also a powerful antioxidant with a possible anti-ageing role in the brain.[10] Your melatonin depends on two things:

your serotonin status (serotonin is made from tryptophan or 5-HTP)

good-quality sleep

Research has used 1–5mg of melatonin at night, particularly in people with poor sleep or cognitive impairment. In the UK, melatonin is prescription-only, so ask your GP whether it’s right for you.

Don’t Forget Niacin

Vitamin B3, in the form of niacin, has a particular link with memory.

A 25-year US study tracked the diets of adults from ages 18 to 30 and assessed their cognitive function in middle age. Higher intakes of four B vitamins, niacin (B3), folate (B9), B6 and B12, were all significantly associated with better processing speed, with niacin showing the strongest association. Niacin was also linked to better executive function.[11]

A study of older adults in Chicago found that those consuming the most niacin (vitamin B3) from food had approximately 70% lower relative risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease than those consuming the least. Higher niacin intake was also associated with slower cognitive decline.[12]

A small double-blind trial from 1985 gave healthy adults approximately 425 mg of niacin (vitamin B3) daily, more than 26 times the standard 16 mg nutrient reference value. After eight weeks, participants showed measurable improvements in short-term memory and sensory information processing compared with placebo.[13]

The first two studies show associations, not proof of cause, but they all point the same way.

NMN (nicotinamide mononucleotide), a vitamin B3 derivative involved in cellular energy production, is attracting interest in brain ageing research. In animal studies, NMN combined with melatonin improved memory and helped protect the hippocampus by supporting mitochondrial function and reducing markers of cell damage.[14] Human trials have since shown that NMN can raise NAD+ levels, but whether it improves memory or protects against dementia remains unproven. NMN is also subject to novel food authorisation in the UK and EU, with regulatory approval still being finalised as of October 2026.

2. Function: Support Brain Energy and Metabolism

Fill the Energy Gap with C8 Oil

Your brain uses about a fifth of your body’s energy, so it needs a reliable fuel supply. People with blood sugar problems, and many older people, struggle to get glucose into the brain’s energy factories, the mitochondria. The result is a brain energy gap.

Your brain has a back-up fuel: ketones, which your body makes from fat. The fastest food-based way to make them is C8 oil, a particular type of medium-chain triglyceride (MCT).

In older adults without dementia, a 2022 review of six trials found that four showed memory benefits from MCTs, mainly in working memory. The authors call for more research to confirm this and settle the best dose.[15]

It isn’t only older brains. At Liverpool Hope University, 30 healthy young adults took 12g or 18g a day of a C8/C10 blend. Aspects of their working memory and planning improved within two to three weeks.[16]

How much to take:

If you’re younger and healthy, start with one tablespoon of C8 oil a day.

Build up to two tablespoons if you’re older, already noticing some decline, or your blood sugar is raised. An HbA1c above 5.4% (36 mmol/mol) counts as raised.

Increase gradually to avoid an upset stomach.

For more on how ketones work, plus fasting and the Hybrid Latté, read ketones and your brain.

Top Up Vitamin D

Vitamin D is a true all-rounder for the brain. It helps calm inflammation and supports the signalling between nerve cells.

A French study followed 916 adults aged 65 and over for up to 12 years. Those with vitamin D deficiency had nearly three times the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease compared with those with sufficient levels. Low vitamin D was also associated with faster cognitive decline.[17]

A large US study followed 12,388 adults, averaging 71 years of age, for up to 10 years. Those taking vitamin D supplements had a 40% lower adjusted rate of developing dementia compared with non-users. However, as this was an observational study, it cannot establish whether vitamin D supplementation itself prevented dementia.[18]

These findings come from observational studies, but a randomised, placebo-controlled trial involving 210 people with Alzheimer’s disease also reported encouraging results. Those given 800 IU (20 µg) of vitamin D daily for 12 months showed improvements in several cognitive test scores compared with placebo.[19]

Aim for a blood level above 75nmol/l (30ng/ml). Read vitamin D for mind, memory and mood for how much to take in winter and in summer.

3. Utilisation: Keep Your Brain Active

Structure and fuel only pay off if you take the car out on the road.

Learning: learning something new, especially something hard that you sometimes fail at, is one of the strongest signals you can send your brain to keep its connections.

Exercise: Regular physical activity supports brain health. In a randomised trial involving 120 older adults, moderate-intensity walking three times a week increased hippocampal volume by approximately 2% over 12 months, alongside improvements in spatial memory.[6] Combining aerobic activity with resistance training is a sensible approach to overall health and fitness.

Social contact: keeps you thinking, talking and remembering.

Sleep: this is when your brain files away the day’s memories.

Here’s a simple plan:

Take up one new skill.
Walk briskly every day and do two strength sessions a week.
Spend regular time with people you enjoy.
Protect your sleep.

For the science, including Professor Tommy Wood’s work on learning by failing, read why an active lifestyle is a brain essential.

Mushrooms and Your Mind: Optional Extras

Various plants and fungi have effects on memory that are worth knowing about. The evidence is earlier-stage than for the nutrients above, so think of these as optional extras on top of the foundations, not instead of them.

Lion’s Mane is a fungus that has improved aspects of memory and cognitive function in small trials:

In a small Japanese trial, adults aged 50 and over who took 3.2 g daily for 12 weeks showed improvements on a test of general cognitive function compared with placebo. However, improvements were not significant on two specific memory tests, and larger trials are needed to confirm the benefits.[20]

Another trial involving 30 people with mild cognitive impairment found improved cognitive scores after 16 weeks, although these gains diminished within four weeks of stopping supplementation.[21]

A small Taiwanese pilot trial involving people with mild Alzheimer’s disease also reported encouraging results. After 49 weeks of supplementation with an erinacine A-enriched Lion’s Mane preparation, participants showed improvements in some measures of cognitive function and daily living, although the findings require confirmation in larger trials.[22]

Reishi (Ganoderma lucidum) has a long history of use in traditional East Asian medicine, particularly for promoting health and longevity. Early animal research suggests potential brain benefits. In a study of mice genetically modified to model Alzheimer’s disease, Reishi polysaccharides improved aspects of learning and memory, promoted the growth of new neurons in the hippocampus and reduced amyloid deposits. However, whether these findings translate into cognitive benefits in humans remains uncertain.[23]

Ginkgo biloba, from one of the world’s oldest surviving tree lineages, has shown some benefits for memory and cognitive performance in small, short-term trials. A 30-day study in healthy adults reported improvements in working memory and information processing, while a six-week trial in older adults found improvements in certain memory tests.[24,25] However, a much larger US trial involving 3,069 older adults found that taking Ginkgo for approximately six years did not reduce the risk of developing dementia.[26]

Typical dose: 120–300mg of a standardised extract.

Caution: it slightly thins the blood, so take care if you’re on blood thinners.

Maca, ginseng, Siberian ginseng and rhodiola are traditionally used to support energy and resilience to stress, and are often described as adaptogens. Early research suggests that some may help with fatigue, mood and aspects of cognitive performance. A review of maca research, for example, identified promising effects on memory and fatigue, particularly with black maca, although much of the evidence came from animal studies.[27] More human trials are needed to establish their benefits for brain health.

Guarana is another popular stimulant, but its main active ingredient is caffeine. While it can temporarily improve alertness and concentration, regular use can lead to tolerance, meaning the same dose may have less effect over time. It can also disrupt sleep, potentially undermining the very brain function you’re trying to support.

To explore the potential benefits of medicinal mushrooms for memory, cognitive function and brain health, watch our Mushrooms and the Mind webinar, which takes a closer look at the science behind these fascinating fungi.

What Foods Support Memory and Brain Health?

There’s no single superfood that brings memory back. What works is a way of eating that gives your brain building materials, steady fuel and protection, every day, for years. Here’s how the best foods for memory fit the three-step plan. For a longer list, see our 15 brain foods.

Oily fish: omega-3 for building your brain. Salmon, mackerel, anchovies, sardines and herring (SMASH for short) provide ready-made DHA and EPA, the forms your brain uses directly.

Eat oily fish three times a week.

Choose smaller fish where you can. They’re lower down the food chain and carry less mercury.

If you don’t eat fish, take an algae-based omega-3. Plant sources like flax, chia and walnuts convert only poorly to DHA. See algae oil vs fish oil.

Leafy greens: folate to keep homocysteine down. Spinach, kale, chard, rocket and broccoli are rich in folate, magnesium and antioxidants. Leafy greens are among the foods most consistently linked to slower memory decline in studies of Mediterranean and MIND diets. Eat a big handful every day. Find out more in greens means brains.

Berries and colourful vegetables: antioxidant protection. Blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, strawberries, red cabbage, beetroot and peppers supply polyphenols that back up your brain’s own glutathione defences. Fresh or frozen both count. Aim for as many colours on your plate as you can.

Eggs, fish and meat: B12 and choline. Vitamin B12 comes almost only from animal foods, and low B12 is one of the most common reversible causes of memory problems in older people. It’s harder to absorb as you age, because stomach acid tends to fall. Eggs also provide choline, which your brain uses to make acetylcholine, the memory neurotransmitter. If you’re vegan or over 60, consider a B12 supplement.

Nuts and seeds: steady fuel and minerals. Walnuts, almonds, and pumpkin, sunflower, chia and flax seeds add healthy fats, fibre, magnesium and zinc. Eaten with carbohydrate, they slow the release of sugar and keep your brain’s fuel supply steady.

Beans, lentils and chickpeas: slow-release carbs. They provide folate, protein and fibre with a low glycaemic load (GL). Use them instead of refined white carbohydrates, which are linked to faster memory decline.

Extra virgin olive oil: the Mediterranean staple. It’s rich in polyphenols and is the main fat in the Mediterranean-style diets most consistently linked to healthier brain ageing. Make it your main cooking and dressing oil. To compare the options, read Mediterranean, DASH or MIND diet?

Whole, minimally processed foods: the common thread. Ultra-processed foods tend to be high in sugar and refined starch and low in everything above. The less of your food comes in a packet, the more room there is for food that actually feeds your brain.

What you cut back on matters just as much. Sugar, white flour, fruit juice and too much alcohol all work against a steady brain fuel supply. Keep them to a minimum.

When Should You Seek Help for Memory Problems?

Everyone forgets things. See your GP if your memory or thinking changes are:

persistent: most weeks, not just now and then

getting worse over months

unexplained: with no obvious reason such as a run of bad sleep or stress

noticed by other people, or getting in the way of everyday tasks like managing money, medicines, appointments or finding your way

sudden: if confusion or memory loss comes on suddenly, especially with weakness, slurred speech or a severe headache, get urgent medical help

Your GP can check for common causes that can be put right, such as low B12 or folate, thyroid problems, infections, side effects of medicines, depression and anxiety. If needed, they can refer you to a specialist memory service.[2] Changing your diet and lifestyle works alongside medical care, not instead of it.

How Do You Know if Your Memory Is Improving?

Memory is subjective, so the only reliable way to know is to measure it, make changes, then measure again. Take the Cognitive Function Test now and retest once a year. Each time you do, you become part of our research as a Citizen Scientist. Together, Citizen Scientists help us discover what people with high scores are doing differently from those with low scores. The more people who take part, the more we all learn.

Diana first took the Cognitive Function Test at 60. Now 70, her cognitive function has improved.

Frequently Asked Questions

Start by Understanding Your Brain Health

Keeping your brain healthy is a lifelong journey, and it changes with the different stages of life. Just like on a road trip, you can sometimes get lost. No single food, nutrient or supplement guarantees that lost memory will come back. What works, for many people, is bringing together the right building materials, fuel and use, and checking regularly that you’re on the right road.

The good news is that you can get back on track. Knowing where you are is the first step. Here are three things to do today to start rebuilding your brain and protecting your precious memories:

Take the free Cognitive Function Test to see where you are now.
Test the biology behind it with the DRIfT 5-in-1 home blood test. It measures:
– homocysteine, which shows your need for B vitamins
– your Omega-3 Index
– vitamin D
– HbA1c, a measure of blood sugar control
– your glutathione index, a measure of antioxidant status
Put one or two pieces of the advice above into action within the next seven days

Thank you for reading!

Food for the Brain is a non-for-profit educational and research charity that offers a free Cognitive Function Test and assesses your Dementia Risk Index to be able to advise you on how to dementia-proof your diet and lifestyle.

By completing the Cognitive Function Test you are joining our grassroots research initiative to find out what really works for preventing cognitive decline. We share our ongoing research results with you to help you make brain-friendly choices.

Please support our research by becoming a Friend of Food for the Brain.

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