Do we really need to be taking fish oil?
For most people, it is better to use fish or pasture-raised egg yolks to get omega-3s. But there are specific reasons to use cod liver oil, fish oil, or krill oil. More details in the video!
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Do you really need to be supplementing with fish oil?
Hi. I’m Dr. Chris Masterjohn of chrismasterjohnphd.com, and this is Chris Masterjohn Lite, where the name of the game is “Details? Shmeetails. Just tell me what works!”
Today we’re going to talk about fish oil. Yumee asks, “Do most people really need to supplement with fish oil?”
In my opinion, most people don’t need to supplement with fish oil, but it depends on the context. So some people for medical reasons are given high doses of fish oil or fish oil-derived fats in order to lower their triglycerides.
The way that fish oil does that is to interfere with carbohydrate metabolism, and in insulin-resistant people or in people with specific genetic differences that might predispose them to having very high triglycerides, you do benefit from interfering that pathway with the fish oil, but I would actually try a low-carbohydrate diet in a lot of those situations to see if that helps with lowering triglycerides, or in the case of insulin resistance, I would try to address the insulin resistance at its root cause.
Oftentimes this could be a result of poor body composition, poor activity levels, or other things, like a low-quality diet. Now, for other people, I do think it’s the case that for people who do not eat fish and for people whose animal products, especially their eggs, are mostly from animals fed grains rather than pasture-raised animals or who don’t eat eggs, I think in those cases there is an argument for fish oil in the sense that those people are probably not going to get enough omega-3 fatty acids, but the better argument might be: Eat pastured eggs or eat fish. Even eating an oily fish like salmon once or twice a week is probably good enough to provide the omega-3 fatty acids that you need. Eating some pastured egg yolks every day is probably good enough to provide for the omega-3 fatty acids that you need.
Those foods provide enormous amounts of other nutrients that are good for you. nSo it is way better to eat those foods than to take fish oil. With that said, some people find it very difficult to get vitamin A or vitamin D, and particularly for vitamin A, cod liver oil may be a very important source of that vitamin. Cod liver oil is a form of fish oil that happens to be high in the fat-soluble vitamins. Vitamin A is best found in liver. It’s better in my opinion to eat liver once a week, but there are a lot of people out there who are not going to eat liver once a week. So if you are using cod liver oil to get the vitamins that you can’t get from food—and I should point out that vitamin A can also be derived from plant foods, but many people genetically or for other reasons don’t derive it very well from plant foods.
So for those people who will not eat liver, cod liver oil on a daily basis can be a very good way of getting that. And you do benefit from the omega-3 fatty acids, and with the cod liver oil, it may even be unimportant to eat fish if you’re getting the cod liver oil, although it’s still better to focus on the fish, the egg yolks, and just add some of the cod liver oil.
If you find yourself in a position where you are just not eating any of these foods, and you want to get enough omega-3 fatty acids, then I think fish oil is okay, but I would limit not the amount of fish oil but the amount listed on the label of EPA and DHA combined. I would limit that amount to around 250 milligrams per day because I don’t think most people need more than that. Some signs that you might not be getting enough omega-3 fatty acids include chronic low-grade inflammation, poor visual acuity, slower mental processing, trouble learning, and possibly Alzheimer’s disease and psychiatric conditions, like depression, anxiety, and attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder, ADHD.
Under these conditions, it may make sense to try fish oil even at higher doses than what I recommended. There is some evidence that krill oil will get the omega-3 fatty acids better into the brain in the psychiatric conditions that I listed. And there is some evidence that EPA-rich fish oils are better than DHA-rich fish oils for some of those psychiatric conditions as well. So there’s room to play around with the different possibilities if those things apply to you. But for the average case, limit the fish oil to 250 milligrams of EPA and DHA combined when you take it, but in all cases, go for food first, and go for fish oil only after you have exhausted those possibilities.
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well said. the quality of the fish oil is important. a test for good quality is, put capsules in a freezer. the next day check them. if they froze mostly water a poor quality. where they get the fish oil is important. home work needed to find a good source.
Hello Chris,
This is a disappointingly too-low potency suggestion for EPA-DHA intake, for adults, in general. “…limit the fish oil to 250 milligrams of EPA and DHA combined when you take it…”
This is in disagreement with Dr. Andrew Stoll, MD of Harvard, as we see in his book, The Omega-3 connection. Also, published studies continue to first get approval from IRB’s to provide 3,000 mg/day of EPA/DHA because it’s safe and the researchers know what dosage range will produce the best study data.
My chronic atrial fibrillation (Afib), for which I was having 10-15 serious “events” a year, quit happening after I read enough data to guide me to take 3,000 mg of EPA/DHA a day. If I take 1,500 mg a day the Afib returns. It’s a 1 to 1 correlation and has been for over a dozen years now.
As one of 3/4 Irish genetics, my Afib was/is probably simply a deficiency of omega-3’s, as my ancestors lived with high consumption of fish.
The average American is grossly deficient in omega-3’s and many other essential nutrients. We need science-based recommendations for appropriate supplemental amounts because this is easier than depending on people to drastically improve their diets.
You’ve done incredibly well in providing progressive science-based information about many food topics that push the status quo to re-think positions, especially about eating fat.
Please consider upping your game related to potency recommendations for dietary supplements. The dose comparison effect is thoroughly documented in the published literature in about 20,000 studies. https://www.supernutritionusa.com/images/pdf/SPN_potency_matters.pdf
The efficacy of 2,000 to 3,000 mg of EPA/DHA at creating bigger, healthier babies is graphically seen in https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2621042/.
Further, high omega-3 babies had higher scores for eye and hand coordination and other such barometers of mental acuity.
Drug addicts given 3,000 mg a day experienced an over 60% decrease in anxiety and feelings of anger. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2275606/pdf/nihms-41356.pdf
Perhaps we would have fewer alcoholics and even anxiety-riddled people if more people were getting plenty of omega-3’s.
As is true with all nutrients, too little produces “failure to thrive.” Optimal potencies produce optimal effects.
Thank you for reading this.
Michael Mooney