Fatty Acids For The Eyes & Brain: The Good And The Bad

Good For The Eyes; Good For The Brain

We’ve written before about omega-3 fatty acids, covering the basics and some lesser-known things:

What Omega-3 Fatty Acids Really Do For Us

…and while we discussed its well-established benefits against cognitive decline (which is to be expected, because omega-3 is good against inflammation, and a large part of age-related neurodegeneration is heavily related to neuroinflammation), there’s a part of the brain we didn’t talk about in that article: the eyes.

We did, however, talk in another article about supplements that benefit the eyes and [the rest of the] brain, and the important links between the two, to the point that an examination of the levels of lutein in the retina can inform clinicians about the levels of lutein in the brain as a whole, and strongly predict Alzheimer’s disease (because Alzheimer’s patients have significantly less lutein), here:

Brain Food? The Eyes Have It!

Now, let’s tie these two ideas together

In a recent (June 2024) meta-analysis of high-quality observational studies from the US and around the world, involving nearly a quarter of a million people over 40 (n=241,151), researchers found that a higher intake of omega-3 is significantly linked to a lower risk of macular degeneration.

To put it in numbers, the highest intake of omega-3s was associated with an 18% reduced risk of early stage macular degeneration.

They also looked at a breakdown of what kinds of omega-3, and found that taking a blend DHA and EPA worked best of all, although of people who only took one kind, DHA was the best “single type” option.

You can read the paper in full, here:

Association between fatty acid intake and age-related macular degeneration: a meta-analysis

A word about trans-fatty acids (TFAs)

It was another feature of the same study that, while looking at fatty acids in general, they also found that higher consumption of trans-fatty acids was associated with a higher risk of advanced age-related macular degeneration.

Specifically, the highest intake of TFAs was associated with a more than 2x increased risk.

There are two main dietary sources of trans-fatty acids:

• Processed foods that were made with TFAs; these have now been banned in a lot of places, but only quite recently, and the ban is on the processing, not the sale, so if you buy processed foods that contain ingredients that were processed before 2021 (not uncommon, given the long life of many processed foods), the chances of them having TFAs is higher.
• Most animal products. Most notably from mammals and their milk, so beef, pork, lamb, milk, cheese, and yes even yogurt. Poultry and fish technically do also contain TFAs in most cases, but the levels are much lower.

Back to the omega-3 fatty acids…

If you’re wondering where to get good quality omega-3, well, we listed some of the best dietary sources in our main omega-3 article (linked at the top of today’s).

However, if you want to supplement, here’s an example product on Amazon that’s high in DHA and EPA, following the science of what we shared today 😎

Take care!