Omega 3 - brain food for thought

Posted Sunday, January 1, 2006 at 4:14pm in Off topic  | 

For a few years now I’ve had an interest in food nutrition and how different foods and nutrients do different things to the body. For example, how carbohydrates found in potatoes, pasta and rice give the body extra energy and how proteins found in chicken, fish and eggs help muscles to grow and repair quicker.

What we put in our mouths has an effect on our overall health and well-being is something that has always interested me. Although, lately I haven’t been paying particular attention to my own health - hence it’s a New Year’s resolution.

A healthy diet can change your mood, make you feel more energetic, stop you from being ill and in the long run, make you live a longer and healthier life.

But one part of the body that often gets overlooked that needs good nutrients just as much as any other part, is the brain. The brain is indeed a muscle itself and just like any other muscle, it needs exercising and feeding.

Some time ago, I watched a BBC documentary on disobedient children with specific learning difficulties in my home town, County Durham. The children were subject to an Oxford University study where they were given specific amounts of the essential fatty acid, Omega 3.

Omega 3 is a rich oil found in fish. It is said to boost brain power and increase your attention span. Each of the children were given regular doses over six months. One child was falling behind on his schools work, had difficulty reading and had no interest in doing anything apart from watching TV.

Through the course of his treatment, there was a dramatic change in his reading and writing ability. He no longer wanted to watch TV and preferred to read books instead. It said he even developed an interest in classical music. Similar things happened to the other children tested also.

Since watching the programme, I thought I’d give them a try myself, so I bought a pack from my local health store and have been pretty much taking a capsule every day since. Call it a placebo effect, but I really do believe that they actually work. I’ve found my concentration span has increased and I’m finding my thirst for knowledge is bigger - things that would not normally interest me now do.

If you haven’t tried them already, I recommend you do. It would be good to hear if anyone else is having similar experiences.

To download the BBC’s report (pdf) click here.

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