EFFECT OF GLUCOSE AND PERIPHERAL GLUCOSE REGULATION ON MEMORY IN THE ELDERLY

We examined changes in cognitive performance following the intake of a glucose (50 g) or saccharin solution (50 mg) in fasted elderly male a nd female subjects. Glucoregulation was estimated using a recovery ind ex that was used to categorize subjects within each sex as having poor or good recovery. Elderly males with poor recovery performed worse on the Logical Memory subtest of the Wechsler Memory Scale and on the fr ee recall or recognition parts of a word List task. The item analysis of the Logical Memory subtest showed that male subjects with poor reco very remembered less of the last items of the paragraphs after drinkin g saccharin while the first items were equally remembered by both grou ps. Glucose improved the performance of the males with good regulation for the first seven items while the performance of males with poor re gulation decreased for those items under glucose. The present study su pport the notion that peripheral glucoregulation can influence memory performance and that the ingestion of glucose can influence certain as pects of memory functioning. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Inc.