Fishy Medicine

The vast majority of bipolar treatments have found a place on the goverment’s schedule of controlled substances. If it makes you happy, it can probably get you high. Or something like that. Omega 3 fatty acids come over the counter. About the size of a multivitamin, a pair could pose a solution to the darker half of the manic depressive conundrum.

I first heard of it from my councilor. The potential for mood stabilization without side effect was too much to ignore. So I bought a bottle. Since I really have no way to know if they are working, especially considering I was already being medicated with a host of pharmaceutical monstrosities, remained unconvinced of their clinical merit and decided to study up. The research is in it’s infancy with few double blind trials conducted on small test groups, but here is what I learned:

Omega 3s appear functionally similar to lithium (they both inhibit PKC )¹, the glowing difference being where lithium makes your mind dazed and hands shake², fish oil might give you a little stomach ache³. Oh, and lithium can fucking kill you. Oily stool or death? not hard.

A four month double blind study of 30 bipolarites showed promising results for anti-depressive properties. Unfortunately, 50% of the placebo group had dropped out by the two month mark because, well, they got depressed. Pumped with 9 grams/day, the omega-3 group held strong; even those on no other medications showed a marked decrease in depression³. The effect was so pronounced, in fact, that the study was prematurely terminated; they decided it was unethical to withhold the treatment from the placebo group⁵.

In another study, which I couldn’t read for free, they gave 10 people 2 to 3 grams/day. They used that classic questionnaire we’ve all taken to monitor their progress. Within a month, 4/5 had dropped 50% of their depressive symptom. Inconclusively, none of the test subjects experienced any manic symptoms during the period of the study⁴. Though several other studies suggest that the fatty acids have no effect on mania, positive or negative⁶.

One last point of interest. If you suffer persistent irritability, Omega 3 to the rescue. 37 manic depressives taking 2 to 3 grams/day cut their irritability in half. Rather than suffer 18 days of the grumpies every month on average, they got away with 9.

Overall, it’s clear fish oil has real potential. It’s cheap, risk-free, and if you suffer the mood swinging crazies there is no reason not to give it a go. Speculatively, it could well compliment the manic suppressing effects of traditional mood stabilizers with it’s penchant for battling depression. If you want to learn more, check out citations 5 and 6. Loose stools or not, Omega-3 has a permanent place in the medicine cabinet. Right next to my multivitamins…and sanity pills.
antidepressant

1. Inhibitory effects of omega-3 fatty acids on protein kinase C activity in vitro
2. Wikipedia – Lithium Pharmacology
3. Omega 3 Fatty Acids in Bipolar Disorder
4. Omega-3 eicosapentaenoic acid in bipolar depression: report of a small open-label study. -Abtract
5. Omega-3 fatty acids in mood disorders: an overview
6. Omega-3 fatty acids as treatments for mental illness: which disorder and which fatty acid

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