TREAD: Time Restricted Eating Intervention for Alzheimer's Disease

Trial statusRecruiting
Trial phasePhase 1
Trial typeInterventional
Biological sexAll
Age60+
SponsorUniversity of California, San Diego

About this trial

The goal of this clinical trial is to learn if restricting the time of eating to allow for prolonged fasting at night may reduce sleep disturbances, cognitive decay, and pathology in patients diagnosed with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) or early to moderate Alzheimer's disease (AD). It will also learn about the feasibility of practicing 14 h of nightly fasting in this group of older adults. The main questions it aims to answer are:

* Does prolonged nightly fasting of 14 h can reduce markers of AD pathology and aging and reduce cognitive and sleep alterations in MCI and AD patients? * Can patients with MCI and early /moderate AD sustain time-restricted eating for 3 to 6 months? Researchers will compare participants who fast for 14 h per night during 3 months to those who fast for less than 12 h/night. Researchers will also compare participants that fast for 3 months to those who fast during 6 months, to determine the effective duration of the intervention. Finally, researchers will evaluate whether following the time-restricted eating diet alongside a partner actively following the same diet, will increase adherence to the protocol compared to subjects that fast alone.

Participants will:

* Fast for 14 h a night (stop eating at 8 pm and start eating the following morning at 10 am) for 3 or 6 months * Visit the clinic three times (at the beginning of the study, 6 and 12 months later) * Provide blood samples and take a cognitive test during clinic visits * Keep a diary (or use an app on a smart phone) to record time of eating * Wear an activity tracker watch

Eligibility criteria

Qualifiers

Persons, aged ≥60 years

In good general health as evidenced by medical history or diagnosed with clinical diagnosis of MCI/AD: meeting research consensus criteria for probable MCI or dementia due to AD, requiring positive amyloid biomarkers in brain or cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) obtained at their regular point of care or study referral no longer than 3 months prior to screening.

Ability and willingness to complete cognitive evaluations, blood draw, actigraphy monitoring and to record fasting times daily.

Daily night fasting <12h at baseline. Ability and willingness to follow an eating protocol of prolonged night fasting for 14 h

Disqualifiers

Clinical diagnosis with a neurodegenerative condition other than MCI/AD.

Presenting cognitive impairment not due to AD.

Clinical diagnoses of diabetes.

Actively using insulin in the past 6 months.

Trial design

Treatments tested in this trial

  • Time-restricted eating

Treatment groups

60 Participants
are divided into 2 treatment groups

Sponsors and collaborators

University of California, San Diego

Lead sponsor

National Institute on Aging (NIA)

Collaborator