Hi. Dr. Moses Goldberg, naturopathic doctor. I wanna talk to you today about the importance of omega-3 essential fatty acids. Omega-3 essential fatty acids are a really key nutrient for us and our health. Now we are the only mammal that cannot make omega-3 fatty acids. Our friends the bats and the opossums they can do that, but we can’t. And so we have to get them from our diet, and there’s a couple of ways of getting them. Some are through plant sources like walnuts and flax seeds, and some are through animal sources like trout, salmon and other game meats like elk, bison and buffalo. Now, alpha-linolenic acid, the omega-3 takes about 14 biochemical steps to get to these chemicals called EPA and DHA.
Now the flax and the walnuts, the plant-based sources have a poor conversion rate. It’s about 14 steps to get to that. And so, if you’re a vegetarian you need to eat a lot more of the flax and the walnuts to help drive that reaction. If you do eat animal products like the salmon and the trout and the game meats, it’s actually a quicker process of four steps. Once you have the EPA and DHA in your body as it is metabolized, you will find that you can gain a lot of health benefits. There’s been a lot of studies that the EPA/DHA has helped with cardiovascular disease, depression, anxiety, conditions of ADHD, it’s a really strong anti-inflammatory. It’s an amazing omega-3 fatty acid oil that can help your body heal from a lot of, a variety of conditions. Now, I recommend if you are gonna take omega-3 oils, if you can eat the sources having salmon a couple times a week, or if you’re gonna choose a supplement to get at least one gram a day of the EPA/DHA.
So look on your bottles at the supplement facts and see how much EPA/DHA and add that up to one gram a day. And that’s a really good therapeutic dose to start with. Again, I have found personally and through my patients that, bringing in omega-3 fatty acids specifically from plant bases or from animal bases can really enhance your health. Again, from heart disease, neurological conditions, the mental and emotional issues of anxiety and depression, ADHD. It has a strong anti-inflammatory effect from osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis, it’s a really key nutrient. Again, we don’t make it so we have to get ’em from our dietary sources. So I want you to consider bringing this into your diet, either through supplementation or from the food you’re eating to get omega-3 fatty acids.
I hope you’re having a great day. If you have any other questions, please let me know at docmoses.com and I could be reached at the office at 707-284-9200. Make it a great day and live well.
