Fish oil could help prevent Alzheimer's

Fish has long been hailed as 'brain food,' and now a new study has revealed that fish oil supplementation can help ward off diseases such as Alzheimer's.

It was found that people with higher levels of the omega-3 fatty acids, which are found in fish oil, may have larger brain volumes in old age equivalent to preserving one to two years of brain health.

Shrinking brain volume is a sign of Alzheimer's disease as well as normal aging.

For the study, the levels of omega-3 fatty acids EPA+DHA in red blood cells were tested in 1,111 women who were part of the Women's Health Initiative Memory Study. Eight years later, when the women were an average age of 78, MRI scans were taken to measure their brain volume.

It was found that those with higher levels of omega-3s had larger total brain volumes eight years later. Those with twice as high levels of fatty acids (7.5 vs. 3.4 percent) had a 0.7 percent larger brain volume.

"These higher levels of fatty acids can be achieved through diet and the use of supplements, and the results suggest that the effect on brain volume is the equivalent of delaying the normal loss of brain cells that comes with aging by one to two years," study author James V. Pottala, PhD, of the University of South Dakota in Sioux Falls and Health Diagnostic Laboratory, Inc., in Richmond, Va, said.

Those with higher levels of omega-3s also had a 2.7 percent larger volume in the hippocampus area of the brain, which plays an important role in memory.

The study was published in the journal Neurology.