Any successful healthy weight loss diet plan will tell you that there is no magic pill when it comes to weight loss. In their weight loss tips though they should be discussing this healthy weight loss tip. Recent studies have shown a well-known supplement is proving to be very beneficial in enhancing your healthy weight loss diet plan.
The phenomenal health benefits of essential fatty acids have been known for some time now, but what’s almost startling is the recent research citing powerful weight loss benefits as well. In a May 2007 study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition it mentions this, “The test group which incorporated essential fatty acids into their weight-loss plan lost more body fat than all the other test groups combined.” This is huge no matter what healthy weight loss diet you may be following.
The Facts Of Essential Fatty Acids
While it is not known exactly why essential fatty acids – termed essential because they cannot be produced by the body and must be consumed through diet – enhance weight loss efforts, I believe it can be due to several breakthrough reasons:
1. DHA has been shown to prevent the conversion of pre-adipocytes(pre-fat cells) to adipocytes (fat cells) and mediate pre-adipocyte death (kill ‘em before they become immortal fat cells).
2. Fish oil has the ability to increase the clearance of chylomicrons (certain type of fat cell) and fats following a meal. This potentially can have a positive effect on substrate utilization (fat usage).
3. Fish oil can "artificially" decrease heart rate thus increasing the level of exertion needed to reach desired intensity. Essentially you burn more overall calories. This was shown to be true in a recent study completed in Australia looking at the impact of exercise and fish oil on weight loss. The researchers found that the combination of exercise and fish oil led to an increase in fat loss.
4. Fish oil upregulates mitochondrial machinery and increases oxidation of fats within fat cells. This wonderful process means your body burns more fat as energy instead of storing it.
With the overwhelming clinical research pointing to the need for essential fatty acid supplementation, most fitness enthusiasts should be incorporating them into their healthy weight loss diets and any healthy eating plans. As for recommending a brand of fish oil I have to admit I am biased as I am the director of research and development for Prograde Nutrition. I recommend EFA Icon. Whatever brand you buy just remember that quality does come with a price. Don’t go cheap or you may experience the wonderful fish burps. 
The overall health benefits of this product though are so outrageous it would be silly for me not to prescribe them to just about every one of my clients. Add this to your list of healthy eating guidelines.
Yours in health,
Jayson Hunter RD, CSCS
America’s Trusted Weight Loss Expert
1. Hill AM, Buckley JD, Murphy KJ, Howe PRC. Combining fish-oil supplements with regular aerobic exercise improves body composition and cardiovascular disease risk factors. 2007, pp 1267-1274.
2. Kim HK, Della-Fera M, Lin J, Baile CA. Docosahexaenoic acid inhibits adipocyte differentiation and induces apoptosis in 3T3-L1 preadipocytes. The Journal of nutrition2006; 136: 2965-2969.
3. Smith BK, Sun GY, Donahue OM, Thomas TR. Exercise plus n-3 fatty acids: additive effect on postprandial lipemia. Metabolism 2004; 53: 1365-1371.
4. Flachs P, Horakova O, Brauner P, Rossmeisl M, Pecina P, Franssen-van Hal N, et al. Polyunsaturated fatty acids of marine origin upregulate mitochondrial biogenesis and induce beta-oxidation in white fat. Diabetologia 2005; 48: 2365-2375.
5. Guo W, Xie W, Lei T, Hamilton JA. Eicosapentaenoic acid, but not oleic acid, stimulates beta-oxidation in adipocytes. Lipids 2005; 40: 815-821.
Tags: essential fats, fish oil, krill oil
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Hi Jayson,
Excellent news. The image shows some fruits and nuts. Can you recommend any of those, which can provide the required fatty acids. This is required for strict vegans who won’t eat even fish in India.
Your blog posts are very educative. Please continue the good work.
Great article! The only part I disagree with is your choice of fish oil. I use Flameout which has so much more of the good stuff.
I’m on a few exercise web sites & learned of this supplement while beginning an intense cardio program @ my gym & toward the end added yoga. With the fish oil supplement, I lost 30 lbs, since last Sept. I’m going to keep it as a supplement to my diet. I’m glad you & others are getting the word out about Fish Oil.
You won’t get the same potency from other foods that contain these essential fatty acids as you would from fish or fish oil pills, but here are some foods that do contain essential fatty acids.
Avocados
Almonds
Flax Seed
Flax Seed Oil
Olive Oil
Olives
Hope this helps
Jayson
Hey Jason
Thanks for the advice. The recomended dayly does of fish oil is quite low to achieve the weight loss metioned in the reseach how much fish oil should you be consuming?
You will find a lot of different information in regards to how much fish oil should be consumed. Some of it has to do with the fact that the research is still pretty new and no one knows for sure yet what exactly works and what doesn’t. Also, the quality of the fish oil has something to do with it also. For example Krill oil has a much higher potency and ORAC value then conventional fish oil so you don’t need to take as many pills to have the same effect. I would probably say 1-3 grams per day of fish oil is the most common recommendation.
Jayson
Great article!
Do primrose oil & borage oil work as well? Those seem to be my favorite — though olive oil and flaxseed oil work well for me too.
Other oils such as olive oil, flaxseed, etc are good, but they are not considered complete essential fatty acid providers. There has to be some conversion to EPA and DHA where fish oil is complete and there is no conversion of ALA by the body.