We hear a lot of talk about fats. Some fats are fatty acids. It turns out your brain is made up of over half fatty acids. The good type of fatty acids found in your brain are not made by the body. Instead you have to eat those fatty acids or your body can convert some fats into the kind it needs. Rather than get lost in those details, your brain needs DHA and omega-3’s.
At the 2024 Lifestyle Medicine conference, the Brain Docs presented evidence that eating fish oil is good for the brain. People who take a fish oil supplement were less likely to get dementia.
Now, personally, I don’t eat a lot of fish. I grew up on the Great Lakes, and our fish options tended to be breaded and fried and laced with PCBs and other nasty chemicals. I also don’t want dementia. So I found myself inclined to take fish oil.
We hear a lot about how fish bioaccumulate toxins. I wanted to make sure my fish oil was toxin free. So I take a fish oil supplement that is pharmaceutical-grade, meaning we know that it has no contaminants and we know its exact composition. The fish oil supplement I take is the Omega-3 Plus from NeoLife. I take one of those a day as part of my ProVitality daily pack from NeoLife, which is equivalent to one-half serving of fish per day or 3.5 fish per week.
Now, NeoLife used to call this supplement Salmon Oil Plus. They changed the name, and I had an extra bottle of the Salmon Oil at my office. My plan was to give it away to someone who wanted to try fish oil. I have seen a few videos talk about the anti-inflammatory properties of Salmon Oil when taken at higher doses, but I have never promoted that or done that. Then I had a conversation where someone mentioned to me they had started high dose fish oil and all their joint pains disappeared.
As you may know from my Instagram feed, I have a pretty gnarly back injury and recovery has taken years. Although I’m getting stronger, I’m still creaky. So after hearing this unexpected testimonial about high dose fish oil, I looked at my extra bottle of fish oil and decided… “what the heck?” I’m going to do an experiment on myself.
For the next month I am going to take high doses of Omega-3s from NeoLife and see what happens to my joints. I’ll post a blog update in 4-6 weeks to let you know what happens.
Cheers! – Dr. Joe
