One Group of People Might Benefit From Taking Fish Oil to Slow Alzheimer's

 It has been demonstrated that including fish oil in your diet on a regular basis improves mood, supports brain health, and lowers the chance of brain lesions, which are believed to be an obvious sign of cognitive decline.

However, what about older folks who already have white matter brain damage? Could fish oil pills stop the deterioration process and slow the onset of diseases like Alzheimer's?

  

Using a cohort of 102 volunteers, ages 75 to 95, who had the beginnings of neurological damage known as white matter lesions but showed little to no signs of cognitive impairment, an Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) team examined the effects of omega-3 fatty acids found in fish oil.

During the course of the three-year trial, omega-3 fatty acids had no effect on the group as a whole, but they significantly reduced the rate at which damage was building up in one subgroup: those who carried the APOE4 gene, which has been associated with an increased risk of Alzheimer's disease.

 

There were "significant reductions" in the breaks of nerve cells, another important marker of brain health, among people with a hereditary predisposition to Alzheimer's disease, even if the treatment did not appear to reduce the growth rates of the white matter lesions.

According to neurologist Gene Bowman, who was at OHSU when the research was conducted, "the fact that neuronal integrity breakdown was slowed in people randomised to omega-3 treatment who are also at high risk for Alzheimer's disease is remarkable and warrants a larger clinical trial in more diverse populations in the future."

  

According to the research, taking fish oil supplements may help some people who are at risk of dementia but won't stop or delay the disease's progression in general.

According to OHSU neurologist Lynne Shinto, "our results showed that over three years, there was not a statistically significant difference between the placebo and the group that took fish oil." "I don't think it would be harmful, but I wouldn't say you need to take fish oil to prevent dementia."

  

Larger clinical trials are what the researchers hope to conduct in order to examine the relationship between APOE4 carriers, the course of dementia, and omega-3 fatty acids. This should help us understand the potential impact of fish oil.

Even though Alzheimer's is a complicated illness, research on it helps us understand the condition better and find ways to treat it. Research that is as thorough as this one is especially useful in figuring out how and why the ageing processes of various people's brains differ.

   

"This is the first dementia prevention trial to use modern prevention tools, such as a blood test and brain scan, to identify not only people at high risk for dementia but also those well-suited to receive a specific nutritional intervention," Bowman explains.