Why Alpha Brain, Focus Factor and Prevagen Miss the Mark

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We’re here to help you improve your memory by covering all pertinent topics – this includes reporting on brain supplements. As with any type of product you buy, there are a few excellent products, tons of mediocre products, and some downright horrible products. The same is true with brain and memory supplements.

When I learn about any brain supplement that’s becoming popular, I check it out. When I find an excellent product, I will share that with you. But when I find a popular and heavily marketed product that doesn’t  deliver on its promise, I want to warn you about that, too.

I have some serious reservations about the safety and effectiveness of all three of these popular brain supplements – AlphaBrain, Focus Factor, and Prevagen.

Alpha Brain

You can tell a lot about a company, its products, and philosophy from its website. You can tell even more about their target audience. Clearly, a middle-aged person with an occasional senior moment isn’t who this company has in mind! They are trying to reach a customer base that is young, male, and frankly, a little crazy.

Joe Rogan, host of Fear Factor, is an Alpha Brain spokesman. Fear Factor is a reality show where contestants see who can last the longest in a tear gas chamber or in a tub of snakes.

Alpha Brain claims to increase creativity, memory, and promotes lucid dreaming, so you can learn how to control your dreams.

There are many product testimonials on the site. Here’s a typical one by Mahk Lynch. (That’s a picture of him enjoying a turkey leg.) Mahk says: “Took a test this weekend on Alpha Brain. I felt like a chainsaw cutting through butter. Getting score soon!” I’m not sure if his name is Mark and he misspelled it, or if it’s really Mahk.

Alpha Brain has another product you might be interested in – Alpha Nails. This is nail polish for “manly men”. Their tagline is “Designed for Men. Worn by Warriors.” It’s promoted for wrestlers and boxers so they look good in the ring.

You can’t make this stuff up.

What about the product itself? While it contains several ingredients that are helpful for the brain, such as Huperzine A and l-theanine, this product doesn’t have curing senior moments in mind. And there is no way I would trust my brain health to this group of wild and crazy wingnuts.

Unless this sounds like your scene, I would recommend finding a memory supplement proven safe and effective with a different demographic in mind.

Focus Factor

Focus Factor is a supplement that can’t decide what it wants to be – is it a multivitamin supplement or is it a memory supplement?

At first glance, their label looks like that of a multivitamin. It contains the usual vitamins and minerals, but there are some obvious nutritional gaps, such as only having 25% of the RDA of vitamin D and only 5% of calcium. I would not consider it complete enough to take the place of a good multivitamin. 

I don’t like that it contains iron. Unless you are anemic and have been told to take iron by your doctor, men and post-menopausal women should not do iron supplementation. 

It also contains 692 mgs of a “proprietary formula” to support brain health which contains some herbs, amino acids, and omega-3 fatty acids. Considering you need more than that of omega-3′s alone, you aren’t going to get enough to meet your body’s needs. You would need to take an omega-3 supplement, too.

The manufacturers took the shotgun approach and put a little bit of everything in this product. But since so much bulk consists of vitamins, it doesn’t seem possible you’d get sufficient dosage of herbs to count as an herbal brain supplement, either.

One bottle contains 60 pills. The recommended dosage starts with 4 pills per day and works up to 8, if needed. At this rate, a bottle would last anywhere from 1 to 2 weeks. This makes it not the bargain it initially appears to be.

Would a truly high quality supplement be sold at Walmart, Costco, or Sam’s Club? I have my doubts.

Prevagen

Important Update! Since I wrote this post, this supplement has come under fire from the FDA. The FDA has sent the manufacturer a warning letter regarding several issues. Read more about it in How I Won a Bottle of Prevagen and Why I Won’t Use It.

Prevagen is a single ingredient product. It contains apoaequorin, which is a calcium-binding protein extracted from jellyfish.

The theory behind Prevagen is that too much calcium in the brain is believed to prematurely age brain cells. So by binding calcium in the blood stream, it can keep brain cells alive longer. Prevagen claims to have done studies, but these were done on cells in test tubes, not on humans.

The other question that begs to be answered is that if you are binding calcium, aren’t you reducing the amount available for bones and teeth? There is virtually no information to address this. I’ve scoured the web looking for such studies but I’ve come up dry.

In looking at third party reviews, a number of people expressed similar concerns about binding calcium in your blood stream which could affect bone health. There also is some controversy about whether these proteins even survive digestion.  

Personally, I would pass on this brain supplement until more research has been done on the relationship of calcium binders and bone loss.

What Supplements Should You Take Instead?

Instead of trying one of these so-called brain supplements, I recommend starting with these three core nutritional basics to give your brain (and your body) optimal nutrition:

1) Cover your bases with a high quality multivitamin.

2) Give your brain the essential fatty acids it needs. Fish oil is good but is no longer considered the gold standard. Taking a krill oil supplement is actually much better.

3) Round off your brain nutrition regime with a potent antioxidant supplement. This will keep your brain protected from one of it’s biggest enemies – free radical damage. 

Give a balanced nutrition program a chance to work. Then if you still need a bran boost, look into memory supplementation. Make sure you are taking one from a reputable company that does what it claims. Follow the guidelines in How to Choose a Good Brain Supplement and you won’t go wrong!

SOURCE: Consumer Complaints About Vital Basics – Focus Factor at ConsumerAffairs.com

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