DHA-supplemented Infants Exhibit Higher Gesture Communication

This research trial was conducted to evaluate the effects of supplementation with fish oil containing DHA/EPA omega-3 fatty acids on neuro developmental outcomes and language in infants. For this purpose, 420 term infants were randomly assigned to receive either a DHA- enriched supplement (providing at least 250 mg DHA plus 60 mg EPA daily) or a ‘placebo’ (with olive oil lacking DHA/EPA) from birth to 6 months. The capsules were pierced and squirted into the baby’s mouth in the morning just before breast feeding or added to their formula during their first daily feed. Blood samples were taken from the infants at 6 and 12 months to measure their DHA status. Assessment of the infants by the Macarthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory-MCDI (Words and Gestures) was performed at 12 and 18-months while infant development via the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development (BSID-III) was conducted at 18-months as was the Achenbach Child Behavior Checklist for assessing mental health and behavioural development.

As expected, both the red blood cells and plasma phospholipid samples showed significantly higher levels of both DHA and EPA at 6 months when taken from infants that had been supplemented with DHA/EPA relative to controls (‘placebo’ group). No significant differences between the two groups of infants were found for the BSID-III scores or neurodevelopment assessments. However, omega-3 supplementation resulted in significantly better gesture scores on the MCDI relative to the controls both at 12 and 18 months of age. For example, the average raw scores for later and total gestures were higher by 35 % and 23 %, respectively, at 12 months.

Since gesture precedes spoken word acquisition and is associated with later developing vocabulary skills, the authors recommend future and larger multi-centre studies to assess longer- term outcomes of language development in relation to omega-3 intakes.