The Omega 3 fats in flax seed oil aren’t as healthy

The health benefits of fish oil are becoming more and more well-known. Sales of fish oil supplements have exploded faster than any other nutritional supplement in history, and for good reason. More and more people understand that adding some fish oil to your diet daily is extremely good for your health.

However there are different forms of the Omega 3 essential fatty acids, and today we wanted to talk about the differences between these, and why fish oil is a better source of the Omega 3 fats than some other popular sources such as flax seeds.

There are a number of different fatty acids known as the Omega essential fatty acids. There are the Omega 3 fatty acids, for example but there are also Omega 6 and 9 fatty acids as well.

It is the Omega 3 fatty acids that are the most beneficial to your health, in fact some of the others are not beneficial at all. But even amongst the Omega 3 fats there are different types.

DHA (docosahexaenoic acid) and EPA (Eicosapentaenoic acid) are the 2 most important of the Omega 3 essential fatty acids. DHA in particular is extremely important to overall good health as well as to mental function. A large portion of your brain is made up of fat and a large portion of that fat is DHA.

DHA is important to both the development of the brain as well as to brain function throughout life.

The best source of DHA and EPA is fish, and in particular oily fish as these fats are found in the oil.

However there are other sources of DHA and EPA as well. Unfortunately these are now not as effective as they once were.

Grass fed beef is a good example. The essential fatty acids come from grasses. And so a cow raised on grass also has the Omega 3 fats DHA and EPA. In fact that’s where the DHA and EPA found in fish comes from. It comes from seagrass which the fish eat, then passes up the fish food chain.

However almost all our beef is now grain fed, and there are no Omega 3 fatty acids in grain, and hence very little in beef now. The same applies to other food sources such as chicken and eggs.

Some people seek to get their Omega 3 fats from plant sources. Flax seeds for example are promoted as a good source of Omega 3 fats, however many people are unaware that the form of Omega fats found in plant sources such as flax is a different form.

It is neither DHA or EPA, it is in fact called ALA, and is not nearly as effective for improving your health as the other 2.

In fact the primary health benefits of ALA is that it can be converted in the body into DHA and EPA, however only a small percentage of it is actually converted.

So for this reason fish, and in particular oily fish, are streets ahead. And if you can’t eat lots of oily fish then high quality fish oil capsules are the best alternative source.

Fish is expensive, however it is much more cost-effective to take superior quality fish oil capsules every day than it is to eat fish, and of course you’re not subjecting yourself to the risks of Mercury contamination from eating too much fish if you’re taking quality fish oil capsules which are free of contaminants.

However not all fish oil capsules available on the market are high quality, and some have been found in the past to contain industrial toxins like Mercury.

We hope that has enlightened you a little more to the differences between the different types of Omega 3 essential fatty acids, and the best way to incorporate the health benefits of fish oil into your diet.

Nutrition education and additional information on healthy food choices are available through the Benedictine University online nutrition and wellness graduate degree program.

The health benefits of fish oil supplementation can include protecting your hearing, strangely enough

You’ve probably realised if you’ve read our website that an adequate intake of the Omega 3 essential fatty acids found in fish oil are beneficial for a wide range of health problems. But it might not have occurred to you that the health benefits of fish oil included helping you hear better.

Yes that’s right, there are studies which are demonstrating that increasing the amount of the Omega 3 essential fatty acids in your diet can reduce the likelihood that you will suffer from poor hearing.

2 studies have come to this conclusion, one in Australia and another study in Holland.

It is not fully understood why more of the essential fatty acids could help you hear better, or at least reduce your likelihood of poor hearing.

In Holland the study examined the hearing of the various participants and tested their ability to hear both high and low frequency sounds and asked each participant to fill in a questionnaire about what they ate. This was then used to examine what dietary intake they had a number of things including their intake of Omega 3 fatty acids.

3 years later each of the participants was again measured and examined, and the conclusion drawn in the study was that those who exhibited the most hearing loss were those who had the lowest amounts of the Omega 3 fatty acids in their diet, in other words those who ate the least amount of seafood.

This study is also supported by the results of an Australian study which found that those who have the highest consumption of the essential fatty acids are somewhere around 10 percent less likely to suffer from loss of hearing when compared with people who have the lowest intake of fatty acids.

This study was undertaken over 5 years, and it was found that the rate at which hearing loss occurred was somewhere around half for those who ate fish up to twice a week compared to other people in the study who had a greater amount of hearing loss and who rarely or never ate fish.

Needless to say you can’t assume that if you eat lots of fish, or better still supplement your diet with high quality Omega3 supplements, that you’re fully protecting yourself from loss of hearing. Loss of hearing can be a result of many factors including exposure to high levels of noise throughout your life, often in industrial situations, and taking more Omega 3 in your diet won’t reverse this.

But it will certainly help it seems, and there is such a wide range of health benefits from fish oil supplementation that you are also attracting numerous other health benefits to yourself as well as potentially protecting your hearing.

These studies examined the rate of intake of fish in each of the participants, fish being the major source of the Omega 3 essential fatty acids DHA and EPA, though there are other minor sources as well.

However unfortunately fish is becoming more and more expensive as we overfish our oceans, and it is becoming uneconomical for the average family to buy fish twice a week at $30 a kilo.

The good news is that for somewhere around $20 you can buy high quality fish oil supplements which allow you to supplement your diet with high levels of DHA and EPA every single day for an entire month. Read the rest of this entry