Death Risk and Use of Fish Oil Supplements

Since nutritional supplementation in capsule or tablet form is very common in older US adults, the present study was conducted to determine if the use of certain supplements may be associated with total mortality. One of the many supplements which was monitored in this study was fish oil containing DHA/EPA omega-3 fatty acids. A total of 77,719 participants (aged 50-76 years) from Washington State were followed for an average of 5 years. A ‘low-use’ category of supplementation was defined as using less than 4 days/week for less than 3 years during the 10 year period before baseline while ‘high-use’ was defined as a frequency of use for at least 4 or more times/week over a period of 3 or more years. After adjusting the results for numerous confounding factors including gender, age, smoking, physical activity, other factors, the overall death frequency (per 1000 person-years) was 17 % lower in the ‘high-use” category as compared to the non-users while the death frequency in the ‘low-use’ category was almost identical to the non-users.

The authors concluded that there was a ‘suggestion of a decreased risk for total mortality associated with a high intake of fish-oil supplements’ but the differences did not reach statistical significance.