Fish Oil Guide

Fish oil is one of the most well known and historically used food supplements. It can help with quite a few different health problems. This hub will try to explain what is fish oil and how does it work. There will also be some guidelines on how much of it you should take and a look through the possible side effects.This article is meant to be an information for people interested in fish oil and is not a real medical advice. You should always consult  your physician before taking fish oil or any other food supplements for that matter.

What Is Fish Oil?

Fish oil is an oil (obviously) that is extracted from fatty fish tissue. The most common fish used in the production of this oil are salmon, tuna and mackerel because they give the best quality fish oil because of the high concentration of fatty acids. Fatty acids? The reason for the many health benefits of fish oil lies in fatty acids. Fish oil is full of them and they are called Omega-3. Omega 3 are essential fatty acids - your body needs them to function properly and a lack of them can cause several health problems.

Our bodies synthesize them from the foods we eat but if our diet is not properly balanced (which is not that rare) there is a deficiency of these substances in our body and problems can occur, our health can deteriorate.

To fight this deficiencies we can either change our diet and include more fish in our food or we can start taking fish oil to supplement our essential substance intake.

The main benefits of fish oil are:

- can help with heart problems, lower triglycerides-a certain type of blood fat-and increase "good" cholesterol

- reduces inflammation which is good for all sorts of problems like arthritis, joint problems...

- helps with heart disease, cancer, autoimmune diseases, psoriasis, and Alzheimer's,

- helps brain recover after stroke,

- helps in brain development with children,

- better eyesight,

- slows down the aging process (more on anti aging nutrition here),

- it can help with some mental diseases.

But all is not good - there are some problems with taking fish oil. Fish from which fish oil is produced are predators, they are on the top of the food chain. This means that a lot of potentially dangerous toxins and substances that they get through their diet stays in their tissue. The potential contamination of fish oil is therefore quite high with mercury being the most "common" problem.

Because of this fish oil producers have developed more sophisticated and effective filtering methods that can produce 100% safe fish oil.

Dosage?

Dosage depends on your sensitivity to fish oil and on the problem that you wish to "cure". There are some guidelines on how much fish oil should you take  but always consult your medical doctor if you should take it at all and what the recommended dosage should be.

FDA recommend that you should not take more than 3,000 mg of fish oil per day (except if you are taking it to combat a specific illness). WHO (World Health Organization) recommends that you start with 300 - 500 mg of fish oil per day - you should always start slow and observe how your body reacts to the dosage.

Possible Side Effects?

Apart for the mentioned contamination problem there are some other possible side effects when it comes to fish oil:

- problems for diabetes patients: they should be careful when using fish oil supplements because sometimes high doses of fish oil can increase sugar levels in the blood.

- possibility to gain weight.

- fish oil is also a blood thinner, so it can cause nose bleeds or increased bruising.

- stomach and digestion problems, greasy stools.

- bad breath that smells of fish.

So always consult your doctor before you start taking fish oil.