Can fish oil protect against brain damage caused by alcohol abuse?

According to a new study in PLOS ONE, omega-3 fish oil could protect against damage to the brain caused by alcohol abuse.

Previous studies have suggested that long-term alcohol abuse causes brain damage and increases the risk of dementia.
However, researchers from Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine in Illinois - who conducted this recent study - previously performed a meta-analysis that found drinking alcohol at moderate, social levels - a maximum of two drinks per day for men and one drink per day for women - may reduce risk of dementia and cognitive impairment during aging.

Studies have suggested that long-term alcohol abuse causes brain damage and increases the risk of dementia.

The team reasons that alcohol in moderate amounts "toughens up" brain cells, which makes them more resilient to damage, but that excessive amounts of alcohol overwhelms the cells, causing neuroinflammation and cell death.
To investigate the extent to which omega-3 fish oil may protect against this damage, the researchers behind the meta-analysis - with collaborators at the University of Kentucky and the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism - conducted a new experiment with cultures of adult rat brain cells.
Over several days, they exposed the cell cultures to alcohol concentrations the equivalent of four times the legal limit for driving. This level of alcohol exposure is similar to that seen in chronic alcoholics.
The researchers then compared the brain cultures with other cultures that had also been exposed to the same levels of alcohol, but with the addition of the omega-3 docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) compound found in fish oil.
The team observed that there was up to 90% less neuroinflammation and neuronal death in the brain cells that had been exposed to DHA than in the cells that had just been exposed to alcohol.
"Fish oil has the potential of helping preserve brain integrity in chronic alcohol abusers," says study author Michael A. Collins, PhD. "At the very least, it is unlikely that it would hurt them."
However, the team states that further studies are needed to confirm their findings.
They add that the best way for people abusing alcohol to avoid brain damage is to reduce their drinking to low or moderate amounts, or to give up alcohol altogether.

"Fish oil has the potential of helping preserve brain integrity in chronic alcohol abusers," says study author Michael A. Collins, PhD.

"We don't want people to think it is okay to take a few fish oil capsules and then continue to go on abusing alcohol," says Collins.
Recently, Medical News Today reported on a study published in BMJ that found alcohol does not benefit the heart. The authors of that study suggest that reduced alcohol consumption - even among light-to-moderate drinkers - improves heart health.
Also, in April, we reported on a study by University of Utah neuroscientists, which investigated the region of the brain that regulates our sensitivity to the negative effects of alcohol.
The team behind that study found that when they inactivated a brain region called the lateral habenula in a group of rats and gave the animals access to alcohol, the rats escalated their drinking faster than a control group of rats.
The researchers concluded that the rats with the inactive lateral habenulas were unable to learn from bad experiences, unlike the control rats, who modified their behavior to avoid the negative consequences of a hangover.

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'The higher the cigarette taxes, the lower the suicide rates'

In a new study, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, MO, find a link between suicide rates and cigarette taxes and smoking policies. 

Previous research has shown that smokers are more likely to commit suicide than people who do not smoke. The factor driving this association was assumed by some researchers to be because people with psychiatric disorders are both more likely to smoke and more likely to commit suicide than the general population.

The map displays the range of state cigarette taxes from the lowest (lightest blue) to the highest (darkest blue).
Image credit: Richard A. Grucza, PhD

However, the new study suggests that it may be smoking itself that increases suicide risk - possibly increasing the risk for psychiatric disorders, or making existing disorders more severe. The study also claims that policies aimed at limiting smoking may reduce suicide rates.
"We really need to look more closely at the effects of smoking and nicotine, not only on physical health but on mental health, too," says lead author and associate professor of psychiatry Richard A. Grucza, PhD.
"We don't know exactly how smoking influences suicide risk. It could be that it affects depression or increases addiction to other substances. We don't know how smoking exerts these effects, but the numbers show it clearly does something."
The Washington University team analyzed National Center for Health Statistics' data from 1990 to 2004, a period when individual states began to take different approaches to cigarette taxes and smoking policies.

Fast facts on US suicide rates

• The average annual suicide rate during the study period was about 14 deaths for every 100,000 people
• Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the US, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
• In 2010, nearly 40,000 people died of suicide across the US.

The National Center for Health Statistics records data on every death that occurs in the US. The researchers looked at the states where each person who had committed suicide had lived, and how aggressive the tobacco policies in those states were.
They found that in the states that adopted aggressive tobacco-control policies, suicide rates decreased compared with the national average.
By contrast, in states with low cigarette taxes and less restrictive smoking policies, suicide rates were shown to be up to 6% higher than the national average during the same period.
The researchers also determined whether the people who had committed suicide were likely to have been smokers. They claim that suicide risk among the people most likely to smoke was associated with smoking restrictions and tobacco taxes.
"Our analysis showed that each dollar increase in cigarette taxes was associated with a 10% decrease in suicide risk," Grucza says. "Indoor smoking bans also were associated with risk reductions."
Nicotine may be an important influence on suicide risk, says Dr. Grucza:

"Nicotine is a plausible candidate for explaining the link between smoking and suicide risk. Like any other addicting drug, people start using nicotine to feel good, but eventually they need it to feel normal. And as with other drugs, that chronic use can contribute to depression or anxiety, and that could help to explain the link to suicide."

Grucza adds that he is concerned that many restrictions on public smoking do not cover e-cigarettes, which deliver nicotine through a vapor rather than smoke. He also hypothesizes that if states that have low cigarette taxes and relaxed smoking policies raise taxes and restrict public smoking, then their suicide rates will most likely fall.

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