Keep Omega 3 fats in your diet to aid fetal development.

DHA is an essential fatty acid found right through your body, and in particular your brain. And it has been discovered that DHA is very important in brain development, as well as other aspects of fetal development. DHA is also a major fatty acid found in the retina of the eye, as well as other organs of the body.

Importantly it is also found in breast milk.

Now babies cannot produce their own DHA, so they get it from their mother. They get it through the placenta before they are born and from the breast milk after. For this reason a mother is constantly losing some of her supplies of DHA to her baby.

For this reason experts recommend an Omega 3 supplement to mothers to be and breast feeding mothers. Both to supplement the DHA that baby is getting, and to maintain their own supplies. There are other supplements also recommended for pregnant or nursing mothers, like folic acid, but Omega 3 fats high in DHA are now on the list.

Both for fetal brain and eye development, and other aspects of fetal development.

Recommendations for how much DHA should be consumed by pregnant and nursing mothers varies, but are around 200 to 300 mg per day. With our modern diet it is unlikely that we get enough DHA in our diets.

DHA is found primarily in fish oils, along with other essential Omega 3 faty acids like EPA. However some experts are wary of suggesting that pregnant or nursing mothers should be taking fish oil supplements.

They’re wary because fish can accumulate sea born toxins in their system, like PCBs and mercury. The further up the food chain the fish is the higher the concentration of nasty toxins that you don’t want to be eating.

For this reason though the very best omega 3 supplements go to extreme lengths to make sure that they are completely free of any contaminants.

There are very strict international standards for the levels of contamination accepted in Omega 3 supplements. The very best Omega 3 supplements are free of any form of chemical contamination, because they use a fish that is found in the cleanest part of the worlds oceans, they process the fish in a particular way then they decontaminate to an extreme degree.

There now seems to be little doubt that mothers and pregnant women ought to be taking the best Omega 3 supplements high in DHA, for both their own health and the health and development of their babies. Read the rest of this entry

Is there any reason to increase the intake of Omega 3 fish oils if you have depression?

Depression can be one of the most debilitating conditions you can get. It can have severe consequences for your life, even leading to suicide. There’s many risk factors in depression, and the causes and treatments aren’t fully understood.

Lets have a look at one aspect of depression. The role of Omega 3 fats in depression, and more specifically whether increasing Omega 3 fish oils in the diet can have a role in reducing the incidence of depression.

Over the last 100 years the incidence of depression has skyrocketed. Although it’s not scientific to make the connection, it may be no co incidence that the amounts of Omega 3 in our diets have plummeted.

That’s for a number of reasons. Modern intensive farming practices, for example, have resulted in the reduction of the incidence of Omega 3 in some of our foods, like meat and eggs.

Depression is 60 times higher in New Zealand, where the average intake of fish is 40 pounds a year, compared to Japan where it’s 150 pounds a year.

None of this proves a link between Omega 3 and depression, but suggests that some studies would be useful.

And these studies are now appearing. For example a study published in the American Journal of Phychiatry in 2006 found that a deficit of Omega 3 may indeed “make an etiological contribution to mood disorders and that supplementation with omega-3 fatty acids may provide a therapeutic strategy”.

That’s pretty clear. That isn’t the only study finding that low levels of Omega fats intake may contribute to mood disorders like bipolar, or manic depression.

How could this be? Well, again unscientifically, it’s well known that DHA fats found in Omega 3 fish oils make up over 50% of the brain. And not only that, they also make up a part of the membrane of nerve cells. And that these nerve cells help in brain communication, which is important in good mental health.

But if you suffer from depression then there may be powerful arguments for taking the best Omega 3 supplements, because regardless of how much they may improve your depression they will certainly contribute to your overall health.

As with all of these things there is a need for more studies, and the research moves slowly. Read the rest of this entry

It isn’t just the omega 3 fats that are good for you, it’s the DHA more specifically.

You’ve probably heard by now that Omega 3 fats are good for your health. That’s not news any more. But if you dig a little deeper you’ll keep reading about 2 particular components of omega 3 fats. DHA and EPA. Lets have a look at DHA today.

DHA is short for Docosahexaenoic acid. Sorry, long name.

Omega 3 fats are a collection of what is known as long chain fatty acids. It’s probably not essential to get into the chemistry because for our readers it’s pretty incomprehensible, and boring. But if you really want to read more chemistry try reading Wikipedia.

There are 3 important long chain fatty acids in Omega 3, DHA, EPA and ALA. The bottom line is that DHA is the most important acid in Omega 3, and is essential to your health. And the critical point to remember is that your body cannot make enough of it’s own DHA. Unlike some essential compounds, which your body can make, the DHA you get must come to you through diet.

DHA is the most important fatty acid found in your brain, which is predominantly fat, and that is one of the reasons why Omega 3s are so beneficial to brain function. Over 50% of the brain is made up of fats.

DHA and EPA are found primarily in fish oils. ALA can be found in plants, but fish supplies the best quantities of the other 2 essential fatty acids. So when you eat fish you get those fats automatically via eating it. The original studies done on Omega 3 fats were done on Eskimos who eat fish almost exclusively. Read the rest of this entry