Omega-3 For Your Brain

The New York Times Health section printed an article about a recent study in Neurology. Scientists looked at 1,575 men and women, average age 67, and measured the omega-3 fatty acid content of their red blood cells. This is a more accurate assessment of fatty acid content than using plasma blood or diet analysis. This test is available through my office, by the way. The then looked at these people's brains in an MRI. They found that those with the lowest levels of omega-3 fatty acid content had significantly less brain volume than those with higher levels of omega-3. The researchers felt that this was due to omega-3 fatty acid's ability to reduce vascular pathology, a factor that most likely contributes to brain shrinking. Those with the smaller brains also performed worse on tests of visual memory, executive function, and abstract memory than those people with larger brain volume.