I have been faithfully taking Omega-3 (500mg) three times daily hopefully thinking it will help prevent my arrhythmia from coming back.
Today I came across two articles by Verywell that counter this belief:
verywellhealth.com/fish-oil...
And:
verywellhealth.com/fish-oil...
Now I am thinking I am taking these supplements in vain and doubt whether I should even be bothered to continue. Any thoughts?
I don’t think any supplement is going stop AF returning - eventually - if you are predisposed to AF.
But I do think that if you keep yourself fit and well with good nutrition, good rest and sleep, balanced exercise and manage stress levels then you are giving yourself the best chance to keep AF returning.
My understanding was that fish oils, which I take daily, are more about healthy brain and cognitive functioning?
I hadn't thought about the brain and cognitive function, but apparently there is a lot written about it. Thanks. This Harvard site, although focusing on trials about the heart, does point out that nutrition is best.
My husband developed afib about 4 years ago. He had a sleep study and needed to go on a c-pap machine for his arrhythmias. He used to fall asleep while sitting in a chair. I believe that the afib. started as the result of years before with "sleep apnea". He now sleeps well and has more energy but continues with afib.
Yes I use CPAP for SA & another condition . Unfortunately although it improved my sleep & general well-being, I still had AF - but not at during the night - which I always had prior to CPAP.
You have AFso you will get AF. Take what you wish for better health but don't ever expect it to help AF. There are those who believe that if your diet is good then supplements are a waste of money but how many of us can truely say we have a perfect diet.
That’s why I use the word Nutrition - entirely different which may include supplementation but the more I study, the more complex it becomes.
I'm very competitive, BobD. After three ablations I would like a run of ten years AF free like you. I'm batting a year and a half and still going. Many days I indulge in a lousy diet so I was merely hoping fish oil would help. 😪 But I guess not.
I've read the same thing about fish oil. It's been touted for a long time as a supplement good for the heart. Now I read it's not. It's like a roller coaster. One day something is good, the next day it's not. Fish oil is probably good for high cholesterol. But the catch is we are all different and what may work for one person may not for the other. I take magnesium glycinate and vitamin C. For me both seem to help with arrythmia. You have to find the amount that works for your body. It won't stop Afib as CDreamer says nothing makes it go away. But I agree with her that good nutrition and so on do help. Good luck. This is a wonderful forum with lots of people who want to help.
Absolutely agree. I take magnesium citrate only because it is readily available. I've also taken magnesium taurate but I have to order it.
This is something to check with your pharmacist about. I feel better on fish oil and take it twice a day. I asked if I could take it 3x a day but the pharmacist in my AFib clinic says no, only two. There is a concern about taking it with anticoagulants. medicalnewstoday.com/articl...
I take one capsule of Krill oil per day as studies have shown that it helps to stop blood clotting as my CHADS score is 1 and I am not on ACs. Taking supplements is a bit of a lottery and without the placebo feel good effect (courtesy of the marketing people) I suspect a lot less would be taken.
I have taken Krill oil in the past, and I was thinking of going back to Krill oil when my current supply of Omega-3 is finished. I will look up the studies, and I should ask the pharmacist if I would be double dosing. But, my CHADS score is 4, right up there.
I blow hot and cold on supplements. This has confused me even more . I take Mag Taurate and D3 (in fish oil capsules).
BUT Funnily enough I did find my AF became more frequent on a higher dose of Mag Taurate. I reduced it, and now the AF is better. So a lot of Magnesium is not necessarily the best.
But there's no doubt supplements are big business and someone is making money out of us.
I used to take fish oil but having read various articles showing they don't really work, I don't any longer. Instead I try to make sure I have 2 lots of oily fish a week (mackerel or salmon) for which there is a lot more evidence. I also tried lots of different supplements when I had AF - I used supplements that had been recommended on Afibbers.org, an American site which is very pro supplement. None worked. They did however recommend Vit K2, it doesn't affect AF but it does stabilise my INR on warfarin really well.
Call me a conspiracy theorist but I would want more info about this study and particularly about who had funded it or what conflicts of interest the authors had. From the article it seems that studies are mixed - some giving fish oils the thumbs up, others the thumbs down. But there seems to be a consensus on triglyceride lowering. This alone would to me make fish oils worth considering as triglycerides are by far the fats that you do not want a high level of in your blood. If you have too much junk food in your diet you are more likely to have high triglceride levels. They tend to rise with excess carbohydrate consumption especially sugar. But as CDreamer says fish oils can also play a role in maintaining cognition . Other people think they improve joint mobility. I have taken fish oils for years 1000mg a day.
The author, Kristen Fischer, for Verywellhealth on November 23, 2020, focused on examining the STRENGTH trial which began in 2014 and stopped on January, 2020. Neither her position nor background was stated. It was obviously written for the layperson.
The site below does reveal the authors ( I would have to research more for the conflict of interest) for the STRENGTH trial:
jamanetwork.com/journals/ja...
Kristen also gives a cursory exposure of three other trials:
2007 -- JELLIS trial
2019 -- VITAL trial
2019 -- REDUCE-It trial
Currently, I am taking Omega-3 500mg x 3. I was trying to evaluate if the Omega-3 helped me or not because I don't "feel" it if I take it or not From your explanation of triglcerides and carbohydrates, I am encouraged to keep taking it.
My long trials with this, that and the other have always failed me, much to my dismay. It's no surprise that I've become rather sceptical and sometimes cynical even of claims made by purveyors of "alternative therapies". Clearly, these can produce a positive result in some people, but caution is needed since that figure is small, compared with the population overall. The internet, and social media especially, acts to magnify reality and represents a version of it that is skewed at best and often simply wrong.
It must be remembered that a placebo often creates a 30-40% positive response, especially in the short term. On top of this, the body is essentially a self-correcting organism in which ease and dis-ease come and go naturally, without us doing anything at all. Thank goodness for that. We also live in a society that can't come to terms with the human body being anything other than "perfect" and which sees health and disease as glaring binary opposites.
The effect of intervention into a disease state with a drug or a food such as fish oil (or most effective of them all, snake oil 
), is very hard to prove and leaves rooms for all sorts of claims - some of them quite ridiculous. That's why we need the scientific method to help us out, hence the need for double-blind, placebo controlled, long-term studies.
Steve
The body only heals itself when well nourished & had plenty of the right sort R&R & sleep.
Nutritional well being is ancient but the science is very new, unfortunately it’s really difficult to obtain unbiased funding for expensive clinical trials but then the same could be said of pharmaceuticals. Money really does make the world go round.
I think double blind trials work when testing efficacy of active agents but we humans are so complex & all react so differently I think we struggle to be objective and are led by our bias - I think it was you who posted the study on objectivity?
I agree with you in many ways, but it was my time spent in the drug industry that made me wonder how different we really are. Our differences matter, of course, but only up to a point. For example, commonly prescribed drugs such as analgesics, anti-inflammatories, bronchodilators, steroids, antihypertensives, PPIs, nasal decongestants and so on all work as intended in most individuals (and, I suppose, even chemotherapy drugs could be added to that list). It's interesting, too, that drugs administered under general anaesthesia generally tend to work as intended.
I came to think that what separates us is the way the conscious mind responds to various stimuli, including to pain or, indeed, to the placebo response. I noticed when our two boys were babies and received a similar response, like a small fall, one would cry and the other wouldn't; and when one was hurt, his brother would carry on playing whereas in reverse, his brother would cry and fetch us to help. It's been shown, too, that people who are prone to "hypnosis" are also likely to respond to a placebo. Another example is the "panic" response, which causes prone people to feel much greater fear than others in response to the same stimuli.
It's a fascinating area to study, for sure.
Steve
There is an exception to your statement about drugs working as intended in that for donkeys years drugs were not tested systematically in RCTs on half the population because their pesky hormones were thought to mess up the results. Even now there is very little sex specific reporting of data for side effects in RCTs. It is now known that women are not just small men with a few blobs of fat in specific places but have different physiology and respond differently. The one size fits all approach has resulted in women being overdosed on certain medications. I think in general women suffer more side effects from drugs. Their more active immune systems predispose them to more autoimmune disease and this might be connected and should be investigated. Women are far more likely to be dismissed by their doctors when they complain of illness, side effects etc and told that they are anxious or it is all in their heads and offered an antidepressant. We are different from men and it is time that difference was properly investigated and taken account of.
Perception & how we perceive the world is a powerful factor, we are what we think & unfortunately that’s something we are not taught. I found this very much as a psychotherapist & was very interested in how breaking a finger nail was perceived as a trauma by some whilst others survived horrific abuse & came through smiling. That’s when I saw just how much we differ.
Interesting what you say about the drugs however it is also our minds are our most powerful asset, used in the right way. It’s how the mind develops & what influences it which is fascinating, Stephen Hawkins was a wonderful, living example.
Well, Ppiman, you have given me a challenge. I had to figure out whether the STRENGTH trial fit any of your criteria. I found this site that appears to state it does because the trial is RandomizedParallel
Double-blind
jamanetwork.com/journals/ja...
I, like you, believe in following the science.
Thanks for that. It makes sense, to me. I feel that we are highly developed and evolved beings, well-suited to our environments and able to synthesise most of the required chemicals that our body needs for good health from our balanced diets. It might be that vitamin D falls outside of this since we perhaps likely won't have had chance to adapt to our sedentary indoor life away from the fresh air quickly enough.
My understanding that while under general anaesthesia we tend to react similarly, to the same drug interventions, is something that I find interesting. The so-called psycho-physiological responses to stress and anxiety as well as the individual emotional response to pain (and, indeed, to medical care and intervention) seems to be what separates us quite a lot from each other.
Steve
This was posted here a couple of weeks ago. I bookmarked it as I've found something similar in my own response to supplements. It might be useful to you, too.carrafibdietinfo.com/
I find that magnesium glycinate definitely helps my heart behave itself, and I take K2 to keep the calcium in the right places (bones, not soft tissues like blood vessels and heart).
Good luck!
Thank you, Estele, for the link to the article: more vitamin D, less calcium.
Yes, thank you for that posting by Steven Carr. It was a long read, so I just skimmed it and saved it. I skimmed it again just now and found his take on it:
"Regarding omega-3 fats, which health-conscious people often go out of their way to consume, the following is worth noting: the optimum daily intake to minimise afib occurrence has been reported to be approximately 0.6 gms/day of long-chain omega-3 fats ("DHA+EPA", or "n-3 PUFA"), with greater occurrence of afib at both higher and lower daily intakes than this amount...I take no omega-3 supplements ...Despite experimenting with omega-3 supplements and their withdrawal, I have no personal evidence that they affect afib or ectopic frequency, but choose caution as outlined."
His experience is a living example that there is no need to take Omega-3 for AF.
I take magnesium citrate simply because it is readily available at Costco.
Hi I've been taking it also 3000mg per day and I still have af sometimes we are dubious about stopping taking supplements in case we get an upsurge in our condition even though we don't feel any benefit in taking them most of the time but I think it all comes down to the info we take in there is so much of it some may be right and some not then we make up our minds but after a period of actually using these supplements we are are then in the best place to judge wether or not to continue ....... good luck
I read somewhere that, if you’re on an anticoagulant, then you should stay away from fish oils, so I stopped taking any. Is that wrong?
Neither - personal choice based on what or who influenced you. I take both but 1x1000mg fish oil capsule every other day + oily fish 1 or 2 times weekly - that was on advice from Nutrionist & after talking to my neurologist.
Someone threw a big bottle of Omega 3 tablets at me. It hit me but my injuries were only super fish oil.
thats a good joke....
🦈. 👍
Hi cuore,I have spent many years experimenting with supplements and have perfected a cocktail which really helps me. Please see my story at :
healthunlocked.com/afassoci...............
Omega 3 was never a success for me. My key 3 supplements are magnesium glycinate, CoQ10 and L-Carnitine.
I think Omega 3 is OK for reducing Triglyceride levels which will help with cardiovascular performance but with limited effect as a preventer of AF.
Regards,
The results of the STRENGTH rial support your conclusion. I have heard of L-Carnitine , but I have not investigated. It is certainly a project for another day.
Just for information purposes,
I was taking 2 grams of Fish oil containg EPA and DHA, along with 800 I.U. mixed natural , vitamin E, along with Ginger and Cayenne pepper for my knees and general arthritis.These kept my pains well under control.
Although my 3 doctors were not sure what to say when I started Apixaban, including the Pharmacists. After researching it myself I have stopped taking them. Sure enough I'm in constant pain without them. I know some people on here do still take some of these naturals, I felt I should lay off of them . My calls to the Manufacturers of the anticoagulant, and I means calls, just referred me back to my doctors who referreded me to my pharmacist who referred me back to my doctors. A big Merry go round and no answers only " I'm not sure".
Drugs like Aleve and Ibuprofen as is Aspirin are out of the question . Tylenol is useless for me. My son takes Fish oil for his brain injury and cognitive issues.
I read that study that fishoils are useless for heart issues. If I remember correctly, past studies promoted fish oils as God sent for Arrythmias. The story changes by the hour.
It depends who is funding the studies.
And we don’t yet know enough of anything to say for sure.
I wish they studied naturals under government funding /vitamin suppliers/universities just so we would know more facts. I asked the Pharmacist to check her Pharmacopeia,the drug bible. She said she hadn't seen one in years. Things have changed a lot since I called on Doctors and Pharmacists as a pharmaceutical rep.
Professor Tim Spector’s latest book “Spoonfed” lists research studies, and concluded good ordinary diet better than supplements.
We now have three definitive sources that fish oil does not help in preventing AF occurrences:
1. The STRENGTH trial
2. Dr. Steven Carr's logged journey
3. Tim Spector's Spoon-Fed
However, it might aid for the topics triglycerides and carbohydrates.
maybe it's too early to say: AF has decreased significantly since I have been taking iodine from spirulina for 2 days. I think my fibrillation is due to the thyroid which does not produce enough hormones. normal. For some it can be ok a tsh of 3 but for others it is not good and if you have symptoms of the disease you need treatment. I also found out from another source that iodine helps in fibrillation. I have tsh 3.
Yes. When one has AF, there should be attention to the thyroid.
New Study on Fish Oil for Those With AFIB
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