Research paper
Effects of vitamin B-12 supplementation on neurologic and cognitive function in older people: a randomized controlled trial
Study answer
What this study found
Vitamin B-12 supplementation did not improve neurologic or cognitive function over 12 months in asymptomatic, nonanemic older adults with moderate deficiency. For the vitamin B-12 and placebo groups, the primary outcome of posterior tibial CMAP amplitude showed no benefit at 12 months, with analyses based on 91 participants per group. The main cognitive outcome, CVLT memory, also showed no effect (mean difference -1.4 words; 95% CI: -2.9, 0.1 words). Biomarkers improved as expected in the active arm, with serum vitamin B-12 rising from 231.3 ± 52.0 to 640.9 ± 199.3 pmol/L and homocysteine…
- Study & population
- Randomized controlled trial in older adults aged 75 years or older with moderate vitamin B-12 deficiency (serum vitamin B-12 107-210 pmol/L) and no anemia or overt neurologic or cognitive symptoms.
- Intervention
- Oral cyanocobalamin 1 mg once daily for 12 months.
- Key limitation
- Clinical interpretation is limited by the relatively small active-arm analysis set (91 for neurologic and cognitive outcomes), 12-month follow-up, and enrollment of generally healthy, asymptomatic older adults, which may reduce generalizability.
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Open PDFOriginal abstract
Background: Moderate vitamin B-12 deficiency is relatively common in older people. However, there is little robust evidence on the effect of vitamin B-12 supplementation on neurologic and cognitive outcomes in later life. Objective: We investigated w…