An injectable emulsion containing two omega-3 fatty acids found in fish oil markedly reduced brain damage in newborn rodents after a disruption in the flow of oxygen to the brain near birth, a study by researchers at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons has found. Brain injury due to insufficient oxygen is a severe complication of labor and delivery that occurs in one to three out of every 1,000 live births in the United States. Among babies who survive, the condition can lead to cerebral palsy, cognitive disability, epilepsy, pulmonary hypertension, and neurodevelopmental conditions.
Hypoxic brain injury can have devastating, lifelong consequences, and we suggest our novel therapeutic approach using intravenous omega-3 emulsions could markedly reduce these adverse outcomes." Richard Deckelbaum, professor of nutrition and pediatrics and coordinating author of the study The study also found that the novel omega-3 preparation is far more effective in rodents when compared to therapeutic hypothermia, the current standard therapy for this condition and the only one approved by the FDA. This treatment, which involves using cooling blankets for three days, only benefits about 15% of patients and can cause heart and respiratory complications.
"We need to find another treatment for hypoxic brain injury that will be much more effective and feasible than therapeutic cooling and can be used in the immediate hours after the injury when therapy is likely to be mo.
