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Nutrition, Vitamins & Supplements for Seniors
Omega-3 Protects Eyes from Retinopathy as in Major
Causes of Blindness in Senior Citizens
Diabetic retinopathy and age-related macular
degeneration may be helped
 June 25, 2007 - Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty
acids, found in certain fish and supplements, protect against the
development and progression of retinopathy in mice - a deterioration of
the retina. Retinopathy is a general term referring to some form of
non-inflammatory damage to the retina of the eye and includes the major
sources of blindness in senior citizens – age-related macular
degeneration or diabetic retinopathy, although the disease tested in
this study was most closely associated with retinopathy of prematurity.
This is the major finding of a study that appears
in the July 2007 issue of the journal Nature Medicine, although clinical
trials are underway specifically testing Omeg-3 on AMD.
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The study was a collaborative effort by researchers
at Children’s Hospital Boston, the primary pediatric teaching affiliate
of Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Massachusetts
General Hospital, the University of Goteborg in Sweden, and the National
Eye Institute (NEI) and National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and
Alcoholism (NIAAA) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Paul A. Sieving, M.D., Ph.D., director of the NEI,
said, “This study explores the potential benefit of dietary omega-3
fatty acids in protecting against the development and progression of
retinal disease. The study gives us a better understanding of the
biological processes that lead to retinopathy and how to intervene to
prevent or slow disease.”
The researchers studied the effect of the omega-3
fatty acids EPA and DHA, derived from fish, and the omega-6 fatty acid
arachidonic acid on the loss of blood vessels, the re-growth of healthy
vessels, and the growth of destructive abnormal vessels in a mouse model
of oxygen-induced retinopathy.
The retinopathy in the mouse shares many
characteristics with retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) in humans. ROP is
a disease of the eyes of prematurely born infants in which the retinal
blood vessels increase in number and branch excessively, sometimes
leading to bleeding or scarring. Infants who progress to a severe form
of ROP are in danger of becoming permanently blind.
There are also aspects of the disease process that
may apply to diabetic retinopathy, a disease in which blood vessels
swell and leak fluid or grow abnormally on the surface of the retina,
and age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a disease of the macula, the
part of the retina responsible for central vision, and a leading cause
of vision loss in Americans 60 years of age and older.
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Diabetic retinopathy is the most common diabetic
eye disease and a leading cause of blindness in American adults. It is
caused by changes in the blood vessels of the retina.
In some people with diabetic retinopathy, blood
vessels may swell and leak fluid. In other people, abnormal new blood
vessels grow on the surface of the retina. The retina is the
light-sensitive tissue at the back of the eye.
Macular degeneration is a medical condition
predominantly found in elderly adults in which the center of the inner
lining of the eye, known as the macula area of the retina, suffers
thinning, atrophy, and in some cases bleeding. This can result in loss
of central vision, which entails inability to see fine details, to read,
or to recognize faces. According to the American Academy of
Ophthalmology, it is the leading cause of central vision loss
(blindness) and in the United States today for those over the age of
fifty years.
Although some macular dystrophies that affect
younger individuals are sometimes referred to as macular degeneration,
the term generally refers to age-related macular degeneration (AMD or
ARMD).
The researchers found that increasing omega-3 fatty
acids and decreasing omega-6 fatty acids in the diet reduced the area of
vessel loss that ultimately causes the growth of the abnormal vessels
and blindness.
Omega-6 fatty acid contributes to the growth of
abnormal blood vessels in the retina.
To further test the apparent beneficial effect of
omega-3 fatty acids, the researchers studied mice fed a diet modeled
after a traditional Japanese diet (more omega-3 than omega-6 fatty
acids) and mice fed a diet modeled after a traditional Western diet
(lower amounts of omega-3 fatty acids).
In addition, they studied mice genetically altered
with a gene which mammals normally lack that converts omega-6 into
omega-3 fatty acids. They found that the mice with higher amounts of
omega-3 had a nearly 50 percent decrease in retinopathy.
Omega-3 fatty acids create chemical compounds known
as bioactive mediators, which protect against the growth of abnormal
blood vessels, a condition that characterizes some forms of retinopathy.
In part, this occurs because these mediators
suppress a type of inflammatory protein called tumor necrosis factor
alpha (TNF-alpha). TNF-alpha is found in one type of cell, called
microglia, that can be closely associated with retinal blood vessels.
“The retina has one of the highest concentrations
of omega-3 fatty acids in the body,” said lead author and NEI fellowship
recipient Kip M. Connor, Ph.D., a postdoctoral research fellow at
Children’s Hospital Boston.
“Given this, it is remarkable that with only a two
percent change in dietary omega-3 intake, we observed an approximate
40-50 percent decrease in retinopathy severity.”
“Our findings represent new evidence suggesting the
possibility that omega-3 fatty acids act as protective factors in
diseases that affect retinal blood vessels,” said John Paul SanGiovanni,
Sc.D., NEI staff scientist and the other lead author of the study.
“This is a major conceptual advance in the effort
to identify modifiable factors that may influence inflammatory processes
implicated in the development of common sight-threatening retinal
diseases.”
These study results, SanGiovanni emphasized, are
important because they provide a reasonable biological explanation for
findings from a number of human studies on diet and retinal disease, and
they identify low-cost and widely available nutrient-based treatment
approaches that may show merit in future research on diseases that
damage retinal blood vessels and nerve cells.
"The purpose of our study was to discover and
describe the scientific basis for any possible protective role of
omega-3 fatty acids against retinopathy,” said Lois E. H. Smith, M.D.,
Ph.D., senior investigator of the study and associate professor of
ophthalmology at Children’s Hospital Boston, an affiliate of Harvard
Medical School.
“By identifying the fatty acids, lipids and growth
factors involved in both the disease and protective processes, we hope
to translate this work to influence the outcome in patients.
“Our study results suggest that increasing omega-3
fatty acid intake in premature infants may significantly decrease the
occurrence of ROP.
“This changing of lipids by dietary means may also
translate to AMD and diabetic retinopathy. If clinical trials find that
supplementing with omega-3 fatty acids is as effective in protecting
humans against retinal disease as demonstrated by the findings of this
study, this cost effective intervention could benefit millions of
people."
The NEI is currently conducting the Age-Related Eye
Disease Study 2 (AREDS2) that will, in part, assess the effect of
omega-3 fatty acids DHA and EPA on the progression of AMD.
In addition, an upcoming clinical trial at
Children’s Hospital Boston will test the effects of omega-3 supplements
in premature infants.
The National Eye Institute (NEI) is part of the
National Institutes of Health (NIH) and is the Federal government's lead
agency for vision research that leads to sight-saving treatments and
plays a key role in reducing visual impairment and blindness. For more
information, visit the NEI Website at
http://www.nei.nih.gov/.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) - The
Nation's Medical Research Agency - includes 27 Institutes and Centers
and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
It is the primary federal agency for conducting and supporting basic,
clinical and translational medical research, and it investigates the
causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For
more information about NIH and its programs, visit
www.nih.gov.
>> National Eye Institute on Diabetic Retinopathy
http://www.nei.nih.gov/health/diabetic/retinopathy.asp
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