NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Keeping the brain sharp through classes, puzzles, or memory games may slow the pace of age-related memory loss in older adults, study findings suggest.

In the study, nearly 3,000 adults aged 65 to 94 who received training in memory, reasoning and speed of processing were able to reverse the decline in mental ability that often occurs among older people.

Mental function is known to affect a person's ability to live independently, also known as their functional ability, as they age. While the current study found no association between the training sessions and day-to-day functioning, more research is needed to investigate whether they would make a difference over the longer term, since the level of functional decline overall was minimal.

As a whole, the report, published in the November 13th issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association, suggests that age-related mental decline is not inevitable, Dr. Richard M. Suzman from the National Institute on Aging noted in a prepared statement. "The trial was highly successful in showing that we can, at least in the laboratory, improve certain thinking and reasoning abilities in older people," he said.

To assess the effect of different types of memory training on mental function, a team of researchers led by Dr. Karlene Ball from the University of Alabama at Birmingham divided study volunteers into four groups. One group received 10 sessions of memory training during which they were taught strategies for remembering word lists and sequences of items.

A second group learned to solve problems that follow a certain pattern (reasoning); a third group improved their speed of processing through visual searches; and a fourth group did not receive memory training.

The sessions focused on improving memory in a way that could be useful in daily life. Problem solving skills, for instance, can be used in reading bus schedules or filling out an order sheet, while being able to find information quickly can come in handy when looking up telephone numbers or finding information on medicine bottles, the study authors explain.

And according to their findings, all three types of training improved mental function immediately after the sessions and up to 2 years later. Eighty-seven percent of adults who learned to process information quickly, for instance, demonstrated immediate improvements, compared with 74% of adults who received training in reasoning and 26% of adults who underwent memory training. Even greater improvements were seen among adults who received supplemental or "booster" training sessions.

Adults who did not receive any training showed no improvements in mental function, the investigators found. "These interventions have the potential to reverse age-related decline," Ball's team concludes.

SOURCE: Journal of the American Medical Association 2002;288:2271-2281.