Study of Mental Activity and Resistance Training - the SMART Trial

Project Outlines and Aims

One of the key remaining Brain Reserve questions is the direction of causality: does increased mental activity lead to decreased dementia risk, or are individual with low activity levels actually experiencing early dementia symptoms? Our group has therefore been a prominent advocate for testing the ‘use it or lose it’ hypothesis in a randomized control trial. We have now joined forces with leading physical exercise researchers from the University of Sydney to propose a significant new clinical trial to evaluate the efficacy of mental and physical exercise for the prevention of cognitive impairment.

Approximately 180 older individuals with borderline MMSE scores are proposed to be randomly allocated to one of four groups using a factorial design: i) Cognitive Training + Sham Exercise ii) Resistance Training + Sham Psychoeducation iii) Combined Cognitive + Resistance Training iv) Sham Psychoeducation + Sham Exercise. Each participant will complete supervised training in their condition for three months, undergo proximal outcome measures and then longitudinal outcome measures 12 months later.

We have so far pilot tested the efficacy of both memory and physical exercise interventions over the short term. Planned outcome measures will not be restricted to only cognitive change, but will also include neuromorphological and in vivo biochemical changes using magnetic resonance technology in order to assess the impact of these interventions on brain structure and function. Such a trial would therefore be a world-first and fill a critical gap in the field.

Staff

Dr Michael Valenzuela (second chief-investigator)
Professor Perminder Sachdev

Collaborators

Professor Maria Fiatarone Singh, University of Sydney
Associate Professor Bernhard Baune, James Cook University
Associate Professor Nalin Singh, University of Sydney