Eating Fish Can Help You Fend Off Dementia, Alzheimer’s, And Cognitive Decline
If you want to keep your brain sharp, try adding fish to your plate! Eating fish can help maintain your memory muscles and fend off cognitive decline, dementia, and Alzheimer’s disease, according to a new study.
As global life expectancy increases, so do the cases of age-related health issues. By 2050, cases of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease worldwide are projected to be triple the amount they are now.
Therefore, it is more urgent than ever to identify the factors that can prevent cognitive decline. Diet is one of the factors that researchers have been looking into over the past few years.
“We all know too well the impact of diet on cardio-metabolic health and certain types of cancer. The relationship between diet and brain health is far less clear, although there is plenty of evidence suggesting that what and how we eat influences our mental well-being,” said Giuseppe Grosso, a co-author of the study and a professor in human nutrition at the University of Catania.
Fish has long been thought to benefit brain health since it is rich in omega-3 fatty acids and other important nutrients.
Omega-3s have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties that may protect the brain from damage caused by aging.
Previous studies have indicated that eating fish correlates to a decreased risk of neurodegenerative diseases, but the evidence has been inconsistent.
The goal of the new study was to clarify the current evidence on the link between fish consumption and cognitive decline.
The researchers conducted a meta-analysis, which is a type of study that involves examining data from multiple studies to determine overall trends.
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They looked at observational studies that investigated the dietary habits of people over the age of 50 and used a variety of tools to track cognitive outcomes over time, such as clinical diagnoses of dementia or Alzheimer’s and assessments of cognitive decline or impairment.
Food frequency questionnaires and journal entries regarding diet were also utilized in the studies to measure how much fish people ate.
Overall, the researchers included 35 studies in their analysis, with more than 849,000 participants from around the world.
The researchers separated the participants into categories based on how much fish they consumed. Then, they compared the people who ate the most fish to the people who ate the least.
They calculated risk ratios to determine how likely it was for each group to develop cognitive decline.
They found that people who ate the most fish were much less likely to experience cognitive decline than those who ate the least.
The highest fish consumers had an 18 percent reduced risk of cognitive decline or impairment.
Furthermore, high levels of fish consumption were associated with an 18 percent lower chance of dementia and a 15 percent lower risk of Alzheimer’s disease.
“Individuals consuming fish regularly seem to be at a lower risk of cognitive decline,” said Grosso. “The average person should just take this into account since many people simply do not eat fish almost at all.”
So, the next time you’re planning dinner, make sure that fish is part of the meal! The study was published in Aging Clinical and Experimental Research.
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