Abstract
Paola Bozzatello et al. [1] have done a comprehensive qualitative review of the potential use of long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids in the prevention and treatment of mental disorders.[...].
Highlights
Even in conditions like schizophrenia, depression or attention deficit and hyperactivity disorders (ADHD) where most omega-3 fatty acid RCTs have been performed, no final conclusions regarding the use of omega-3 fatty acids can be drawn yet
One of the key problems of systematic reviews investigating the use of omega-3 fatty acids in mental disorders is that they have integrated quite diverse phenotypic groups, e.g., the use of omega-3 fatty acids in controlled treatment trials that assessed depressive symptoms included the following different conditions: Primary diagnosis of adult major depressive disorders (MDD) [2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16]
MDD provide evidence of an association between inflammation and omega-3 fatty acids response: (1) A placebo-controlled trial investigating the positive effects of omega-3 fatty acids on depressive symptoms and chronic inflammation in haemodialysis patients [66]; and (2) a study [67] that found a preventive effect of EPA against the development of depressive symptoms in IFN-alpha-treated hepatitis C virus carriers
Summary
Most meta-analysis including RCTs investigating depressive syndromes confirmed a statistical significant effect in favour of omega-3 fatty acids with minimal to moderate effect sizes depending on the selection of studies (except of one meta-analysis [57]). Martins et al.’s [54] meta-analysis including RCTs with primary and secondary MDD found a significant overall SMD = ́0.291 in favour of omega-3 fatty acids, and detected a marked study heterogeneity and evidence for publication bias.
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