Selective enhancement of focused attention by Alpinia galanga in subjects with moderate caffeine consumption

Abstract

Introduction: The purpose of the secondary analysis of the data from the clinical trial “A Study to Evaluate Efficacy of IP on Alertness and Mental Fatigue” (ClinicalTrials.gov NCT02816827) was to investigate the effect of the Alpinia galanga proprietary extract E-AG-01 (EnXtra) on focused attention, in comparison with caffeine and placebo in moderate caffeine habitués. Participants and methods: A total of 59 caffeine-habituated healthy young adults (aged 18–40 years) with body-mass index of 18.5–25.0 kg/m 2 were crossed over in four interventional groups: placebo, E-AG-01, caffeine, and a combination of caffeine and E-AG-01. All participants completed the attention-network test, which measures the accuracy and speed factors of the alerting, orienting, and executive-control networks. Results: The results of accuracy parameters in terms of percentage-error rate showed a remarkable difference between E-AG-01 and the other treatment groups, wherein the error rate dropped by 1.63% (1 hour), 1.32% (3 hours), and 0.78% (5 hours) from baseline. The caffeine group demonstrated a decrease of 0.37% (1 hour) and 0.44% (3 hours), followed by an increase of 0.2% (5 hours), whereas the error rate of subjects in the caffeine + E-AG-01 group decreased by 0.24% (1 hour) and 0.26% (3 hours), followed by an increase of 0.2% at 5 hours. The placebo group exhibited an increase of 0.14% (3 hours) and 0.77% (5 hours). Conclusion: These results show that E-AG-01 exhibited selectively enhanced focused attention to a higher extent in comparison with caffeine and placebo.