Alzheimer's may progress faster due to taking common supplement

Millions of people take the supplement glucosamine, a sugar molecule which helps people with arthritis and joint pain, but a new study has warned that it could contribute to a faster development of Alzheimer's.

That's according to a study from researchers at the University of Florida, which found that people with Alzheimer's who were also taking glucosamine were 25 percent more likely to die within five years than those not taking it.

The researchers also found that people in the earliest stages of memory loss, also known as mild cognitive impairment, taking glucosamine were 25 percent more likely to develop to full Alzheimer's.

Looking over the records of 24,000 dementia patients in Florida and 41,000 with mild cognitive impairment, they found an association between it and taking glucosamine.

However, Ramon Sun, associate professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at the University of Florida, noted that they'd need to do a controlled experiment rather than looking through patient records to move glucosamine and Alzheimer's beyond an association.

Many older people take glucosamine to help alleviate joint pain and arthritis (Getty Stock Photo)

Of those thousands of medical records they studied, 1,896 with Alzheimer's or related dementias and 2,750 with mild cognitive impairment were taking glucosamine, about eight percent of each group.

They conducted experiments on mice that had been engineered to have Alzheimer's-like symptoms to see how glucosamine might affect the brain.

Healthy mice given the supplement showed no change, but blocking the enzyme that makes sugars like glucosamine in mice with symptoms resulted in improvement.

By contrast, feeding the affected mice glucosamine made their memory loss worse.

Professor Sun said: "Our results suggest that altered metabolism is a significant contributor to Alzheimer's progression and, in addition, addressing the metabolic defect could be an important complement to approaches focused on Alzheimer's plaques and tangles."

A new study warns glucosamine could increase the risk that Alzheimer's progresses faster for people with the disease (Getty Stock Photo)

The professor says further research into the topic matters because millions of people take glucosamine, and since it's a supplement it can be bought over the pharmacy counter by anyone without a prescription.

He explained that Alzheimer's results in sugar coatings on brain and protein cells, these cells normally have chains of sugar that guide proteins to attach to other ones where they can do their job.

However, if someone has Alzheimer's the professor explained these sugar chains build up where they're not supposed to be and the proteins under them start failing.

This results in memory loss and cell death in a process called hyper glycosylation.

While this research has raised concerns about glucosamine, a study from 2023 found a potential link between glucosamine and a lower risk of developing dementia.