Fish Oil (Omega-3)

Dr. Fran Hu of the Harvard School of Public Health reviewed data on 84,688 female nurses, ages 34 to 59, who were part of the Nurses' Health Study over 16 years. They found that high consumption of fish (4-5 times a week) cut the risk of dying from heart disease by 45 percent compared to women who rarely ate fish. Another study published in The New England Journal of Medicine compared 94 men who died suddenly to 181 other men. Men with the highest levels of omega-3 fatty acids had an 81 percent lower risk of dying suddenly than men with the lowest levels. According to Dr. JoAnn Manson of Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital, “the fat in fish actually lowers cholesterol, helps prevent blood clots that form in heart attacks and lessens the chances for the irregular heart beats that cause about 250,000 sudden deaths a year.” If you don't like fish or have allergies to certain kinds of fish, supplements are very effective as shown by the study published in the American Heart Association’s journal Circulation. Participants who took one gram daily of an omega-3 fatty acid supplement reduced their risk of sudden cardiac death by 42 percent.