No effects of omega‑3 supplements on Alzheimer’s symptoms

8 Comments

1. Jenny Brockis on November 3, 2010 at 11:21

   Thank you for your com­ments Pascale.
   A sim­i­lar study from the Karolin­s­ka Insti­tute pub­lished in JAMA in Octo­ber 2006 not­ed that Omega ‑3 sup­ple­men­ta­tion (they used DHA and EPA) was only of ben­e­fit in a small sub­group of their study who had only very mild cog­ni­tive impair­ment. Their rate of cog­ni­tive decline was slow­er over the 6 months than a con­trol group. They also made the com­ment that a pos­si­ble rea­son why the pos­i­tive effects were only seen in those with very ear­ly stage dis­ease, is that there may be a crit­i­cal peri­od of sev­er­al years before the dis­ease man­i­fests itself clin­i­cal­ly, where­by the anti-inflam­ma­to­ry effect of the fish oil may be able to exert an effect on the neuropathology.

   
   
   
2. Pascale on November 4, 2010 at 6:41

   Thanks Jen­ny: Very inter­est­ing and com­ple­men­tary to the orig­i­nal post!

   
   
   
3. Gil on November 23, 2010 at 9:20

   Thank you for post­ing this arti­cle. I do feel that sup­ple­ment­ing with CoQ10 and Omega’s can improve peo­ple’s over­all health and hope­ful­ly delay the onset of cer­tain dis­eases and sick­ness­es. I would assume that it would be very hard to reverse these effects once you are already sick. Pre­ven­tion is Key!

   
   
   
4. Anne Vanderlaan on November 30, 2010 at 2:08

   The study in itself did not even hit upon the ther­a­peu­tic dose of fish oil at 10 grams per day. Also, in my research as a PhD in psy­chol­o­gy at Say­brook Uni­ver­si­ty have found that if a per­son uses the wrong kind of veg­etable oils in their meals it will can­cel out the DHA or omega‑3 on a cel­lu­lar lev­el. I have had suc­cess with peo­ple with demen­tia who took fish oil at a ther­a­peu­tic lev­el, using olive oil in their foods and using butter.I have been research­ing omega‑3 for two years now and have seen dras­tic results in peo­ple who have used fish oil.
   I would like to see a study where they also use raw foods at every meal with fish oil and the right sup­ple­ments. I wish you could post the whole arti­cle so that we can see if those issues were cov­ered. I am sure that over a mil­lion dol­lars was spent on this study.

   
   
   
5. Dr. Pascale Michelon on November 30, 2010 at 9:49

   Thanks for shar­ing your results Anne: Very inter­est­ing! I can­not post the whole orig­i­nal arti­cle but here is the reference: 

   Quinn, Raman, Thomas, Yurko-Mau­ro, Nel­son, et al. (2010). Docosa­hexaenoic Acid Sup­ple­men­ta­tion and Cog­ni­tive Decline in Alzheimer Dis­ease. A Ran­dom­ized Tri­al. JAMA, 304(17):1903–1911.

   
   
   
6. Christopher on November 30, 2010 at 10:27

   Pret­ty intrigu­ing infor­ma­tion there Anne! I’ll fur­ther research this, but I had no idea that cer­tain veg­etable oils can can­cel out the omega‑3 I take on a dai­ly basis. I usu­al­ly stick with olive oil when cook­ing, but I’ll use veg­etable oil as a substitute.

   
   
   
7. Susan on November 30, 2010 at 1:42

   @Anne, you men­tion 10 grams as a ther­a­peu­tic dose. How much should one take for a pre­ven­ta­tive dose? Thank you!

   
   
   
8. Daniel on December 2, 2010 at 3:55

   Is DHA need not to be con­sumed ? Often in adver­tise­ment we see that the drink has DHA that could help brain. Is that infor­ma­tion true?