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Eating
Fish May Reduce ‘Senior Moments’
Reuters
Health via MSNBC.com
November 21, 2007
Misplaced your keys? Can't place that face? Study findings suggest that you may
be able to lessen the frequency of these "senior moments' simply by eating more
fish. And the more fish you eat, the bigger the effect, according to research
conducted in Norway.
Investigators found that elderly men and women who more frequently ate fish
scored better on memory, visual conception, spatial motor skills, attention,
orientation, and verbal fluency tests.
"All six cognitive tests were performed better by those who ate fish," principal
author Dr. A. David Smith of the University of Oxford, UK, told Reuters Health.
Furthermore, he added, the effect was stronger as fish consumption increased up
to a limit of about 80 grams per day.
Smith and colleagues assessed cognitive ability and the average the daily amount
of fish and seafood in the diets of 2,031 men and women, between 70 and 74 years
old, recruited from the general population of Western Norway.
Overall, 1,951 of the study participants reported eating 10 or more grams per
day of fresh, frozen, or canned fish and seafood, or fish products such as cod
liver and fish oil, the investigators report in the American Journal of Clinical
Nutrition. The remaining 80 participants ate less than 10 grams daily.
Study participants who reported more frequent consumption of fatty or lean fish
as their main meal performed significantly better in five of the six cognitive
tests, compared with those who did not eat fatty or lean fish.
Processed fish or fish sandwiches were likewise associated with better
performance on three of the cognitive tests, the investigators note. By
contrast, seniors who consumed only fish oils performed better on just one of
the tests.
The investigators propose the need for additional research to determine whether
the cognitive benefits from fish and seafood consumption depend on the type, the
species of fish or on the preparation.
"Secondly, we need to discover what components of fish are important," Smith
said. Since we found that lean fish was as good as fatty fish, it may not just
be the omega-3 fatty acids that confer cognitive benefit, he commented.
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