Memory loss linked with Alzheimer’s has been reversed for the first time. A small trial conducted by UCLA and Buck Institute has succeeded in using “systems approach” to memory disorders. Alzheimer’s disease has been without an effective treatment for the first time since it was described over a century ago. Study findings are published in the current online edition of the journal Aging.

In the small novel study, the first of its kind, a personalized and comprehensive program to reverse memory loss, nine out of 10 participants displayed subjective or objective improvements in their memories starting within three to six months.

Six patients had stopped working or were struggling at their jobs when they joined the study, and all were able to return to their jobs or continue working with improved performance, with sustained improvements. The patient in treatment the longest amount of time has been receiving therapy for two-and-a-half years.

Among the 10 participants was memory loss associated Alzheimer’s disease, amnestic mild cognitive impairment or subjective cognitive impairment, in which the patient records cognitive problems. One patient with a diagnosis of late stage Alzheimer’s did not show improvement.

The study, conducted by Dr. Dale Bredesen of the UCLA Mary S. Easton Center for Alzheimer’s Disease Research and the Buck Institute for Research on Aging, is the first to suggest that memory loss in patients can be reversed, with sustained improvement, using a complex, 36-point therapeutic program that utilizes comprehensive diet changes, brain stimulation, exercise, sleep optimization, specific pharmaceuticals and vitamins and multiple additional steps that affect brain chemistry.

Bredesen said in a statement that the findings are “very encouraging,” but he added that the results are anecdotal, and a more extensive, controlled clinical trial is needed.

According to the Alzheimer’s Association, an estimated 5.2 million Americans have Alzheimer’s disease in 2014, including approximately 200,000 individuals younger than age 65 who have younger-onset Alzheimer’s.