Science / Medicine : Fish Oil--M-m-m-m-m Good

Fish oil, which has shown promise of preventing heart attacks, now appears to be the first effective way to keep heart disease patients’ blood vessels open after doctors unclog them. A study involving 82 men who underwent coronary angioplasty--in which a balloon is inflated to open up the vessel--found that those who took fish oil extract before, during and after the procedure were less than half as likely to have the vessels close again, a problem known as restenosis.

“I find these data very exciting,” said Dr. Gregory Dehmer, director of the cardiac catheterization laboratory at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

In the study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, Dehmer gave men undergoing angioplasty at the Veterans Administration Medical Center in Dallas the standard treatment of aspirin and another drug that reduces blood clotting. But about half the patients also received the fatty acids contained in fish oil believed to be beneficial beginning a week before the procedure and continuing for six months afterward.

In those who received no fish oil extract, 36% of vessels closed within three to four months of the procedure. By contrast, only 16% of vessels in those who received the fatty acids closed.