A DAILY fish oil supplement has been shown to significantly reduce serious cardiovascular events in people receiving dialysis for kidney failure, according to a new international study co-led by Monash Health.
Over 1,200 participants across 26 dialysis sites in Australia and Canada received four grams per day of fish oil, containing the natural active ingredients EPA and DHA, or a placebo.
Those in the fish oil group experienced a 43% lower rate of serious cardiovascular events, including heart attack, stroke, cardiac death and vascular related amputations, compared with the placebo group.
"Patients on dialysis have extremely high cardiovascular risk, and very few therapies have been shown to reduce that risk," said Adjunct Prof Kevan Polkinghorne, a nephrologist at Monash Health.
"In a field where many trials have been negative, this is a significant finding.
"Dialysis patients typically have much lower levels of EPA and DHA than the general population [which] may help explain the magnitude of benefit observed in this group," he added.
Professor Polkinghorne noted that the findings were limited to patients receiving haemodialysis, and may not apply to healthy people or other patient groups.
Read the study HERE.
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