The Effect of Omega-3 Fatty Acid Supplement in Autistic patients (systematic review)

The Effect of Omega-3 Fatty Acid Supplement in Autistic patients (systematic review)
Fatemeh Shamee,^1,* Valareza Alizadeh,² Sadaf Hassani,³
1. Medical student of Islamic Azad University, Mashhad Branch, Mashhad, Iran.
2. Medical student of Islamic Azad University, Mashhad Branch, Mashhad, Iran.
3. Nursing student, School of Nursing, Midwifery and Medicine Islamic Azad University, Mashhad Branch, Mashhad, Iran
Introduction: Introduction: Autism is a disorder beginning in childhood. It is marked by the presence of markedly abnormal or impaired development in social interaction and communication and a markedly restricted repertoire of activity and interest. Manifestations of the disorder vary greatly depending on the developmental level and chronological age of the individual. More than 1% of newborns are affected by autism, a neurodevelopmental disorder. Brain has high level of lipid and omega 3 plays important rolls in brain. In this review we aim to investigate the effect of omega-3 fatty acids supplementation among patients with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD).
Methods: Methods: In this review, we include articles that discuss about the effect of omega-3 fatty acids supplementation among patients with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). All articles were published between 1992-Sep 2020 and have ethical consideration and use human samples. We searched on PubMed, Google Scholar, science direct search engine with acute keywords: "autism”,"omega-3" and their variations which were obtained from Mesh. According to the keywords of the study, 221 articles were founded. 190 of them were excluded with considering the title; 15 articles were removed with considering the abstract. We use 16 articles at the end.
Results: Results: 16 clinical trial studies (n = 776) were reviewed. 12 articles reported improvement in some behavioral symptoms of ASD by using Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS) questionnaire. The p value of this study was below 0.05. But In 4 articles no significant changes observed and the p value of this study was above 0.05. So, most of the articles have stated that omega-3 may have a positive effect on the treatment of autistic patients.
Conclusion: Conclusions: we conclude from these articles that generally omega-3 acid fat improves symptoms in autistic patients, however, some researches does not show improvement. Answering this question enables neurologists to help patients suffering from autism. Of course, the few studies lead us to focus in this field more than previous. And until now in most of the studies on this topic have the low number of patients.
Keywords: Keywords: autism spectrum disorder (ASD), Omega-3