More from Prevention: The Vitamin That Won’t Cure Your Cold These three supplements are among those with great potential. In their various ways, they’ve been effective against multiple health problems, including heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and even depression. One may help you shed body fat. Another may help you have smarter children. Researchers studying them use the words “incredible,” “extraordinary,” and “exciting” when reporting their results. As a consumer, you’re wise not to get as carried away. While much of the research is good, in some cases it’s still in its infancy stage: done in test tubes, on animals, or with small groups of people. Large-scale trials may still be decades away. Can you try these supplements? Yes, but be sure you make an informed decision. For that, you can start here. [header = The Fat Reducer] Conjugated Linoleic Acid The promise Reduced body fat (particularly abdominal fat); more lean muscle mass; enhanced immunity; cancer prevention; and lower blood sugar, cholesterol, and blood pressure. The back story Twenty years ago, before it even had a name, CLA made the news when a researcher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, looking for cancer-causing agents in hamburger meat, announced that he had isolated an agent that actually lowered the incidence of cancer in mice. Hamburger? A health food? Even if you don’t remember the headlines, you can imagine them. Four years later, the researcher, Michael W. Pariza, PhD, and his colleagues identified the anticancer chemical as a form of linoleic acid (a fatty acid), which they also found in dairy products. (Unfortunately for science but to the delight of headline writers everywhere, they discovered that Cheez Whiz was one of the richest sources.) In the decades since Pariza’s findings, the media—and scientists—have come to regard CLA research with far more respect than amusement. At a meeting of a global group of scientists at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, MD in 2001, one researcher noted that CLA shows “near-term promise” for fighting cancer, lowering blood sugar and fats, and controlling asthma and allergies. One caveat: So far, many of these encouraging findings have only been in animal studies, and in some cases, no human studies are planned. The evidence The most compelling CLA research to date—in both people and animals—focuses on its ability to reduce body fat, build lean muscle mass, boost resting metabolic rate, and maybe even make dieting a little more pleasant. Studies show that it won’t miraculously help you lose weight—you still need to diet and exercise for that—but once you’ve shed some pounds, CLA can help keep you from gaining them back as fat. Pariza and his team discovered that CLA thwarts an enzyme that allows fat to pour into fat cells, preventing them—and you—from growing larger. In one study, researchers put 60 overweight men on a restricted diet to make them lose weight, then told them to resume their old eating habits with one small change: Half the group was asked to take CLA, the other half, dummy capsules. After 13 weeks, both groups regained weight, but for the men who took CLA, more of it came back as lean muscle, not flab. (Muscle weighs more than fat.) More muscle boosts the rate at which you burn calories at rest, making pounds come off more easily. The scientist who discovered CLA also experimented closer to home: He started taking the supplement in July 1996 to shed his own middle-age spread. “I was going up a pants’ size every 6 to 12 months,” Pariza laments. “I was turning into my father.” Today he weighs exactly the same as he did then, “but my waist is two sizes smaller.” Bonus: Another study showed that dieters who took CLA felt better while they were losing—they had fewer headaches and stomach distress—than dieters who didn’t take it. “So it may make it easier for some people to stay on a diet,” notes Pariza. Many of the other reported health benefits from CLA—lower triglycerides, cholesterol, blood sugar, and blood pressure—“are probably related to body-fat control,” Pariza suggests. Animal studies confirm Pariza’s original finding that CLA is a potent cancer fighter. No human trials are planned—no one can agree on how to conduct them—but the researcher speculates that within a decade, scientists will be able to find enough people who have been regularly taking the supplement over time to assess whether CLA also reduces cancer risk. “We’ll be able to see what it does for heart disease too,” he says. No one knows why or how CLA may prevent cancer. But it clearly has positive effects on the immune system. A study from The Netherlands found that men who took a commercially available form ofthe supplement daily developed stronger immunity after a vaccination—a typical method for testing immune response—than those who took a different study formulation or didn’t take it at all. “It really increases your resistance to viruses,” says Pariza. “One company that is licensed to manufacture CLA feels their evidence for this is strong enough to claim that it’s scientifically proven.” There is also some evidence that CLA can inhibit allergic reactions. Where can I get it? CLA is abundant in beef and full-fat dairy products as well as mother’s milk if the mother is eating these foods. Chances are, those rich sources of CLA aren’t an option for you, so supplementation may be your recourse. If you’re planning to take CLA for a medical condition, talk to your doctor first. And remember, without human studies, there’s little known about either short- or long-term effects of taking the supplement. Some study subjects reported minor stomach upset, so most experts recommend taking it with food. For those who make an informed decision to take the CLA plunge, aim for 3 g a day, the dosage most successful in experiments. Pariza suggests looking for supplements that contain Tonalin or Clarinol CLA, since these brands are produced according to stringent standards by companies licensed to use research developed at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. [header = The Heart Protector] Coenzyme Q10 The promise Reduction in symptoms of congestive heart failure and cardiomyopathy, both heart muscle diseases, and Parkinson’s disease; prevention of heart damage in patients on chemotherapy for cancer; boosting the immune system; and potentially fighting cancer itself. The back story Because it’s everywhere in your body, coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10) is also known as ubiquinone, from the word “ubiquitous” meaning present everywhere. The chemical, first isolated from beef hearts in 1957, is essential to the process that allows your cells to produce the energy to do all the things they do to keep you alive. Its chemical structure was determined in 1958 by the late Karl Folkers, PhD, who later received the National Medal of Science for his work with CoQ10 and other vitamins. Folkers and his colleagues were the first to document a deficiency of CoQ10 in people with heart disease, which led to later research into the use of the enzyme in treating congestive heart failure, a condition in which the heart muscle can’t pump blood efficiently. It has also been used to treat cardiomyopathy and to protect cancer patients from the heart-damaging effects of a form of chemo. CoQ10 is also a powerful antioxidant. It can block the effect of free radicals, destructive chemicals produced by everything from pollution to the body’s own chemical reactions. The evidence One study suggests that CoQ10 supplementation can reduce the symptoms—tremors, stiffness, and slowed movement—of some people with Parkinson’s disease, an incurable neurological condition that affects nearly a million Americans. In the multicenter Parkinson’s Study Group, patients in the early stages of the disease who took the highest doses of CoQ10—1,200 mg a day—actually slowed the progression of their condition. As in early studies with heart patients, researchers had discovered that CoQ10 stores are depleted in patients with Parkinson’s. In animal studies, the supplement protected the area of the brain that is damaged in the disease. The researchers believe that CoQ10 supplementation helped the Parkinson’s patients in their study by improving the function of their mitochondria—the “powerhouses” that produce energy in the cells. In studies by Folkers and replicated since, people with congestive heart failure and cardiomyopathy, both frequently fatal conditions, recover more quickly when CoQ10 therapy is added to conventional treatment. In one case, Folkers actually treated 11 patients who were waiting for heart transplants; all improved, some so dramatically that they no longer needed medication. There is also some evidence that CoQ10 can beef up the body’s immune defenses, so there have been some small studies exploring its effect against cancer. There’s never been a randomized clinical trial of the supplement published in a peer-reviewed journal—something that would have to happen before cancer experts would take it seriously. But a related chemical has been shown to suppress cancer growth in test tubes and in animals, possibly by disrupting the process required for cell growth or survival. Where can I get it? It’s hard to get enough CoQ10 in your diet to achieve the 100 mg or more that have been used in clinical trials. Fish and animals have some, but not much. “If you eat a lot of fish and animal products, you’ll get about 15 mg a day,” says Stephen Sinatra, MD, assistant clinical professor of medicine at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine and author of The Coenzyme Q10 Phenomenon. Because they gave patients such high doses in the Parkinson’s study, researchers used a pharmaceutical grade of CoQ10 (Vitaline CoQ10 by Enzymatic Therapy) to prevent an overdose of too much propylene glycol, a chemical added to some brands of the supplement to improve absorption. But before you start popping pills, discuss it with your doctor. If you have heart failure, cardiomyopathy, or Parkinson’s, you should not be self-treating with CoQ10 or any supplement. While the Parkinson’s study in 2003 found that extremely high doses caused no significant side effects, it was not a large enough study to allow researchers to completely rule out any danger. A larger study is planned, but results won’t be available for a few years. If you’re not sick, is there any reason to take it? Some supplement experts, including Prevention columnist Andrew Weil, MD, recommend taking up to 100 mg a day as a treatment for fatigue. Be aware: If you’re taking blood-thinning medication such as warfarin and aspirin, CoQ10 can blunt the drugs’ effects. But if you’re taking statin drugs to lower your cholesterol, your body’s stores of CoQ10 may be depleted—a side effect of the drugs—so it’s worth asking your doctor if a supplement might help replenish them. [header = The Brain Booster] Omega-3 Fatty Acids The promise Less cardiovascular disease; lower risk of lethal heart attack; depression relief; better brainpower in old age; more intelligent children (if mom gets omega-3s during pregnancy); less risk for cancer; fewer menstrual cramps; improvements in rheumatoid arthritis and asthma. The back story Omega-3 fatty acids—hidden in cold-water fish such as salmon, sardines, and mackerel as well as wild game, grass-fed beef, walnuts, and flaxseed—may be the healthiest, yet most elusive, fat you can eat. Prehistoric families feasted on it, but changes in cooking methods and agricultural practices over the past 100 years have nearly expunged it from the modern diet, laments Artemis P. Simopoulos, MD, president of the nonprofit Center for Genetics, Nutrition, and Health in Washington, DC, and author of The Omega Diet. “Traditional sources of omega-3s have dried up. Beef was once a rich source because cattle grazed on grass, which is full of omega-3s,” Simopoulos says. “But today’s grain-fed beef doesn’t have any.” More from Prevention: Are Your Omega-3 Supplements Fake? That’s just half the story. We’re also eating too much omega-6 fatty acids—an omega-3 cousin found in foods made with cooking oils such as corn, safflower, sunflower seed, cottonseed, and soybean. “Humans evolved eating roughly equal amounts of omega-3s and omega-6s,“Simopoulos says. “Today we eat 15 to 17 times more omega-6s.” The omega-6/omega-3 imbalance disrupts metabolism on a cellular level, opening the door to dangerous heart arrhythmias, more depression, faster proliferation of some tumor cells, plus autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. The evidence Studies of 773 people, from the University of Washington, Seattle and the University of Kuopio in Finland, found that those with the highest blood levels of two particular omega-3 fatty acids—eicosapentaenoic (EPA) and docosahexaenoic (DHA)—had a 50 to 65% lower risk of fatal heart attack or stroke than those with the lowest levels. These oily marvels protect the heart’s natural rhythm, guarding against the sudden, uncoordinated heartbeats that can cause death during a heart attack. Higher omega-3 intake was linked to significantly lower rates of depression in a study of nearly 4,000 people by researchers in The Netherlands. “It suggests a direct effect of fatty acid composition on mood,” they note. Other researchers found that people whose persistent depression was not lifted by medication felt better when they took their meds plus fish-oil supplements. “Omega-3s are on the membrane of every cell, so they influence the cell’s function as well as the communication between cells,” Simopoulos says. In the brain, omega-3s seem to make receptors on cell membranes more sensitive to the mood-brightening brain chemical serotonin. Other brain benefits: In France, researchers found that among 246 people over age 63, those who got the most omega-3s—and who had the healthiest omega-6/omega-3 ratio—were 40% less likely to see a decline in mental abilities over 4 years. And in Norway, moms who took cod-liver oil during pregnancy and during early breastfeeding months had children who scored higher—4 years later—on intelligence tests than kids whose moms got omega-6-rich corn oil instead. About 60% of brain matter is made of omega-3 fatty acids. Omega-3s also slowed the growth of tumor cells in a lab study. And women with high intakes seem to have lower risk of breast, colon, and endometrial cancers. Some experts suggest that cancer patients eat more omega-3s to help their medical treatments work better. (Not to mention eating omega-3 fats is one of our 7 Steps to Young-Looking Skin.) Teens whose menstrual cramps didn’t ease up with painkillers or even birth-control pills said the cramps were reduced 30 to 40% after they took fish-oil supplements daily. There’s also evidence that boosting omega-3 intake may lessen the symptoms of asthma and rheumatoid arthritis. Where can I get it? Your body can’t make essential fatty acids; you need to consume them. Salmon, tuna, sardines, mackerel, and other fatty, cold-water fish are full of them. Your best omega-3 eating strategy: “Have fish twice a week,” Simopoulos says. Added insurance: Sprinkle chopped walnuts or ground flaxseed on cereal or yogurt; add spinach and the herb purslane to your salads. These are full of the omega-3 powerhouse, alpha linolenic acid. Your body converts some ALA into the more useful EPA and DHA. (But fish provides more.) Not a fish fan, or worried about mercury? Get 1 g of omega-3s per day from fish-oil supplements, Simopoulos recommends. To find the best-quality supplements, see test results from the independent supplement evaluation lab ConsumerLab.com.(There is a $24 subscription fee to access some of the information.) When the lab tested 20 fish-oil products in 2001, six had inadequate levels of DHA and two were low in EPA. Good news: None of the capsules contained unhealthy levels of mercury. Or go for an omega-3-packed dessert topping. Coromega is an orange-flavored, pudding-like fish oil supplement that tastes great on low-fat ice cream or yogurt. You get 650 mg of omega-3 fatty acids per single-serving squeeze packet. (A box of 28 packets costs $19.95. Call toll-free 877-275-3725 to order.) A Better Omega Balance You need both essential fatty acids—omega-3 and omega-6—to be healthy. Too many 6s counteract the beneficial effects of the 3s, but most of us eat far too many of the former and not nearly enough of the latter. Here’s how to cut your omega-6 intake:
Avoid snacks and baked goods made with vegetable oils rich in omega-6: corn, cottonseed, safflower, soybean, and sunflower.
Cook with olive or canola oil instead (they’re low in omega-6s).
Choose salad dressings, mayo, and margarine made with olive and canola oils.
