Fish Oil: Are There Really Benefits For Your Brain?

New finding published by the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) reveal that there may not be as many health benefits found in fish oil supplements as once believed.

"Contrary to popular belief, we didn't see any benefit of omega-3 supplements for stopping cognitive decline," said NIH's deputy clinical director at the National Eye Institute (NEI) and deputy director of the Division of Epidemiology and Clinical Applications Emily Chew, M.D.

Though rich in beneficial fatty acid omega-3, no hard evidence has shown that these supplements can lower the risk of heart disease, as once popularly believed.

Furthermore, another popular believe showed that fish oil supplements could slow down cognitive decline. However, no benefits from studies suggested such evidence.

In this recent study, researchers from the National Institute of Health conducted research lasting five years to test the efficacy of fish oils in slowing down the process of cognitive decline.

During the study, they followed 4,000 older patients who showed really or intermediate signs of age-related macular degeneration (AMD). The participants also received cognitive function tests at the beginning of the study to establish a baseline and then the same tests were given again two and four years later. All the participants were randomly assigned to one of four groups, including omega-3, Lutein, Lutein and zeaxanthin omega-3 and Lutein/zeaxanthin or a placebo. The average age of the participants was 72, with 58 percent being female.

Study findings showed that no nutritional supplement or a combination really made any difference in helping to prevent cognitive decline.

Researchers also conducted this five-year study, called Age-Related Eye Disease Study 2 (AREDS2), following the first AREDS. looking at a combination of other nutritional supplements for AMD. AREDS2 included omega-3 supplements to the previous combination, but still found no beneficial effects to the decline of cognitive function in older people.

"The AREDS2 data add to our efforts to understand the relationship between dietary components and Alzheimer's disease and cognitive decline," explained senior investigator Lenore Launer, Ph.D. from the National Institute on Aging's Laboratory of Epidemiology and Population Science. However, she added that timing of nutrients or specific dietary pattenrs could poentially slow down the decline of cognitive function. 

However, researchers concluded that more studies would need to be conducted in order to determine if taking supplements earlier would make a difference. 

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