50 years ago, oxygen was promoted as a possible memory loss treatment

Retaining older individuals’s memory — Science News, March 18, 1972

In spite of the olden yearning for the Fountain of Youth, there is a marked absence of researchstudy towards keeping vigor in lateron years. Nonetheless … [researchers] haveactually discovered they can reverse short-term memory loss — or senility — in older clients by offering them routine oxygen treatments in a hyperbaric chamber.

Update

Studies still just tip that exposing clients to 100 percent oxygen at high pressures may offer cognitive capabilities a increase (SN: 10/12/85, p. 236). For circumstances, individuals with consistent signs after moderate head injury who wentthrough hyperbaric oxygen treatment surpassed withouttreatment people on memory tests at least 2 months after the treatments, scientists reported in2020 Exposure to high quantities of oxygen likewise hasactually been revealed to enhance short-term memory in individuals who have had strokes and those with Alzheimer’s illness. The treatments appear to work by moistening swelling in the brain. The jury is still out on whether the technique has a enduring impact on memory.