Dietary intake of n−3 and n−6 fatty acids and the risk of clinical depression in women: a 10-y prospective follow-up study
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Lucas, Michel
Mirzaei, Fariba
O'Reilly, Eilis J.
Pan, An
Willett, Walter C.::94559ea206eef8a8844fc5b80654fa5b::600
Kawachi, Ichiro
Koenen, Karestan
Ascherio, Alberto
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https://doi.org/10.3945/ajcn.111.011817Metadata
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Lucas, Michel, Fariba Mirzaei, Eilis J O’Reilly, An Pan, Walter C Willett, Ichiro Kawachi, Karestan Koenen, and Alberto Ascherio. 2011. “Dietary Intake of n−3 and n−6 Fatty Acids and the Risk of Clinical Depression in Women: A 10-Y Prospective Follow-up Study.” The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 93 (6): 1337–43. https://doi.org/10.3945/ajcn.111.011817.Abstract
Background: The associations between different sources of dietary n-3 (omega-3) and n-6 (omega-6) fatty acids and the risk of depression have not been prospectively studied. Objective: The objective was to examine the relation between different n-3 and n-6 types with clinical depression incidence. Design: We prospectively studied 54,632 US women from the Nurses' Health Study who were 50-77 y of age and free from depressive symptoms at baseline. Information on diet was obtained from validated food-frequency questionnaires. Clinical depression was defined as reporting both physician-diagnosed depression and regular antidepressant medication use. Results: During 10 y of follow-up (1996-2006), 2823 incident cases of depression were documented. Intake of long-chain n-3 fatty acids from fish was not associated with depression risk [relative risk (RR) for 0.3-g/d increment: 0.99; 95% CI: 0.88, 1.10], whereas a-linolenic acid (ALA) intake was inversely associated with depression risk (multivariate RR for 0.5-g/d increment: 0.82; 95% CI: 0.71, 0.94). The inverse association between ALA and depression was stronger in women with low linoleic acid (LA) intake (P for interaction = 0.02): a 0.5-g/d increment in ALA was inversely associated with depression in the first, second, and third LA quintiles [RR (95% CI): 0.57 (0.37, 0.87), 0.62 (0.41, 0.93), and 0.68 (0.47, 0.96), respectively] but not in the fourth and fifth quintiles. Conclusions: The results of this large longitudinal study do not support a protective effect of long-chain n-3 from fish on depression risk. Although these data support the hypothesis that higher ALA and lower LA intakes reduce depression risk, this relation warrants further investigation. Am J Clin Nutr 2011;93:1337-43.Citable link to this page
http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:41275473
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