Fish oil for arrhythmias

[Guest guest]

Here's some terrific info about why fish oil is so critical - again, ESSENTIAL fatty acids - ESSENTIAL means YOU GOTTA HAVE IT! :-)

 

Linda

 

Three Studies Show Benefits Of Fish Oil On Heart Health By Lisa Ellis InteliHealth News Service Whether you're a man or a woman and whether you have heart disease or not, eating more fish apparently can help you to prevent heart-related death. And if you don't like fish, supplements of fish oil also seem to work. These are the collective conclusions of three large studies, published in three different journals, that add to previous evidence supporting the benefits of fish oil. Researchers believe that the benefit comes from the omega-3 fatty acids in fish, and that its main effect is to calm potentially lethal irregular heart rhythms. Viewed alongside previous research, these studies suggest that "everybody" should be eating fish regularly, says Tufts University nutrition expert Alice Lichtenstein, D.Sc., vice-chair of the American Heart Association's nutrition committee. The American Heart Association recommends eating two or more servings a week of fatty fish such as salmon, bluefish, mackerel, swordfish and sardines. These types of fish are rich in omega-3 fatty acids. Other fish and shellfish also contain fish oil, but at lower levels. "These studies are providing very critical confirmation" of the benefits of omega-3 fatty acids, Lichtenstein says. "Now there's three good, well-controlled studies looking at the issue from very different perspectives and all coming out with the same conclusions." Two of the studies center on the apparent benefits of omega-3 fatty acids in preventing sudden cardiac death, which occurs when the heart stops after symptoms lasting less than an hour. Most sudden cardiac deaths are caused by an abrupt, wildly irregular heart rhythm. Here are the principal conclusions of the three studies: a.. Even men who have no apparent heart disease are far less likely to suffer sudden cardiac death if they consume high levels of fatty acids found in fish. Based on the long-term, 22,000-member Physicians' Health Study, these results were reported in the New England Journal of Medicine by researchers at Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health. b.. Women who eat fish regularly have nearly one-third fewer deaths from heart disease and fewer heart attacks than women who rarely eat fish. Researchers from the same schools at Harvard reported these results in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Data came from the more than 84,000 women participating in the long-term Nurses' Health Study. c.. Heart-attack survivors who took fish-oil supplements in a study had only half the level of sudden cardiac death within the first four months of treatment as those who did not get the supplements. Results, published in Circulation, a journal of the American Heart Association, came from an Italian heart-disease-prevention study with 11,000 participants. Researchers were especially pleased to find that fish oil seems to help prevent sudden cardiac death even in people who have no previous diagnosis of heart disease, says Christine M. Albert, M.D., lead author of the New England Journal of Medicine study and an instructor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. Although the risk of sudden death for any individual is "incredibly low," people with no known heart disease "still make up 50 percent of the people who have sudden cardiac death," says Dr. Albert, who is a specialist in heart-rhythm disturbances at Massachusetts General Hospital. She is also an epidemiologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital. Both hospitals are in Boston. After cardiac arrest, the heart must be restarted almost immediately with a defibrillator, or the patient will die. The overwhelming majority of cardiac arrest patients die before reaching the hospital. Dr. Albert says about one-third to one-half of those who have sudden cardiac death also have a heart attack, which means that part of the heart muscle dies from oxygen deprivation. But the vast majority of sudden cardiac deaths are caused by a "chaotic" heart-rhythm disturbance, she says. "It's sudden, so there's no treatment for it" other than defibrillation, Dr. Albert says. "[Fish oil] may be one way we can prevent it. What's believed is that these omega-3 fatty acids may calm the heart and make it beat in a more organized fashion." Both the Physicians' Health Study and the Italian study have reported that fish-oil consumption reduces heart-related death rates, but does not diminish the rate of heart attacks. This is one reason researchers believe fish oil's principal affect is on heart rhythm, not blood clots or plaque in the arteries, which are the primary contributors to heart attacks.

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