Looking at Lions Mane for Alzheimer’s Disease Prevention

Lions mane brain lover. 

🧠✨ 

Prevention of Early Alzheimer's Disease by Erinacine A-Enriched Hericium erinaceus Mycelia Pilot, Double-Blind Placebo-Controlled Study. 2020

41 Participants diagnosed with mild AD consumed placebo or 3, 350 mg/capsule; containing 5 mg/g erinacine A active ingredient for 49 weeks. 

Results

Lions mane intervention showed significant improvement vs placebo in 

🦁 Mini-Mental State Examination 

🦁 Instrumental Activities of Daily Living

👁 Visual contrast sensitivity

🌟Prevention! Other factors, although they did not improve in the lions mane group, they did NOT pathogenically progress as much as they did in the placebo group: Markers like alpha-1- antichymotrypsin (α-ACT)  and the dreaded β- amyloid. Brain structure and tissues were shown to have less pathological changes than placebo too. 

PMID: 32581767

☝️Interesting to note here, this was mycelium based.  We know the active Erinacines are high in the mycelium too, sometimes even higher.  So lions mane is one medicinal shroom where you want to use both mycelium and fruiting body for a full spectrum of constituents. 

🐲 For my at home herbalists and real label readers for best products: Erinacines are a cyathin diterpenoids, best extracted through a 65% alcohol to water ratio, at 62 degrees C. Enzymatic and more acidic ph adjustments can also increase extraction yields.  

🧐 I wonder how soon we will see this hit the market as an overpriced drug. It has great potential to be used as a medication but who knows what synergistic role other constituents (many that we have not even identified yet) might be playing. High quality extracts of the real whole mushroom fruiting body and mycelium are still the way that makes the most sense to me. This maintains the synergy and vitality of the natural wonder, and way we have co-evolved with and for them. And indulging in the deliciousness of this delight and cooking it regularly is a powerful way to get this medicine in too!  Dinner date for your brain! 👩‍🍳 🧠✨🍄

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32581767/

and a little article on the extraction thannngs. https://www.atlantis-press.com/proceedings/lemcs-15/25838091