Another good reason to enjoy a glass of red a day – resveratrol,
the compound found in red wine grape skins, could help to improve balance and
mobility in seniors, research has found. As reported on db.com, the findings, presented to the
National Meeting and Exposition of the American Chemical Society, could lead to
the development of natural products to help protect elderly people against life-threatening
falls.
Researchers fed mice a diet containing resveratrol
for eight weeks, and measured their ability to navigate a steel mesh balance
beam. In the beginning, the elderly mice had difficulty, but after four weeks
they made fewer mistakes and had similar balance to the younger mice.
Dr Jane Cavanaugh from Duquesne University in
Pittsburgh, who lead the study, said it appears resveratrol undoes free radical
damage and helps cells survive. "Our study suggests that a natural
compound like resveratrol could decrease some of the motor deficiencies that
are seen in our ageing population," she said.
"And that would therefore increase an
ageing person's quality of life and decrease their risk of hospitalisation due
to slips and falls,” she added. Despite the positive breakthrough, a 150 pound
person would need around 700 small glasses of wine a day to absorb enough resveratrol to get any beneficial effects.
Cavanaugh is investigating how to develop similar manmade drugs that mimic the
effects of resveratrol while being more readily absorbed by the body. She is
also trying to determine how much resveratrol actually enters the brain. Falls
are the leading cause of injury related death among the over 65s. There
are currently no treatments to help balance in healthy older adults.
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