Hydrogen Therapy Boosts Alzheimer's Treatment When Added to Standard Drug
Efficacy of donepezil plus hydrogen-oxygen mixture inhalation for treatment of patients with Alzheimer disease: A retrospective study
Research hubs: Brain & Nervous System
- Evidence type
- Controlled trial (non-randomized) · Human study
- Authors
- Zhaojun Dan, Haifeng Li, Jin Xie
- Journal
- Medicine
- Year
- 2023
- PMID
- 37505148
- Study Type
- Human
- Participants
- 273
- Delivery
- Gas
- Dose
- hydrogen-oxygen mixture inhalation combined with donepezil tablets
- H₂ concentration
- 66.67% H2 in hydrogen-oxygen mixture
- Duration
- 4 weeks
- Funding
- Hospital level project of Shiyan Taihe Hospital (2020JJXM097)
- Conflicts of interest
- None declared
- Outcome
- Positive
- Peer Reviewed
- Yes
- Cited by
- 3 (OpenAlex, as of November 2026)
- Country
- China
TL;DR
Combining donepezil with hydrogen-oxygen gas inhalation appears to be more effective in treating Alzheimer's disease than donepezil alone.
Key Finding
Patients with Alzheimer's disease who received donepezil combined with hydrogen-oxygen gas inhalation showed significantly greater improvements in cognitive function, daily living abilities, and brain electrical activity markers compared to those receiving donepezil alone.
Summary
This study compared two treatment approaches for Alzheimer's disease in 273 patients: one group received the standard medication donepezil alone, while the other group received donepezil plus inhaled hydrogen-oxygen gas. Researchers measured cognitive function (memory and thinking skills), daily living abilities, and brain electrical activity. The group receiving both treatments showed greater improvements across all measures compared to the donepezil-only group.
Practical Takeaway
This retrospective study suggests that adding hydrogen-oxygen inhalation to standard Alzheimer's treatment may enhance cognitive benefits, though the study design (looking back at past medical records rather than a controlled experiment) limits how definitive these conclusions can be. More rigorous clinical trials would be needed to confirm whether hydrogen-oxygen inhalation is truly beneficial as an add-on therapy for Alzheimer's disease.
Abstract (excerpt)
To investigate the clinical effect of donepezil combined with hydrogen–oxygen mixture inhalation in the treatment of patients with Alzheimer disease (AD), a total of 273 AD patients admitted to our hospital from March 2018 to March 2022 were retrospectively analyzed and assigned into an observation…