tains slightly more EPA than DHA in each serving, in mood disor- ders, it is necessary to get a product that is 2-3 more EPA than DHA in each capsule. The evidence for omega 3 fish oil supplementation helping with depression comes from small studies. The one larger study that used a pharmaceutical fish oil called Lovaza in cardiac patients who were already on prescription anti-depressants, showed no improvement in depression scores after 10 weeks compared to those taking the anti-depressant alone. One caveat to that study was that the Lovaza did not have the high proportion of EPA relative to DHA that may be needed specifically in mood disorders and this could explain for the negative results. Have you ever been to South Florida? Perhaps you landed at Miami International Airport and walked outside into a clear sky with radiant sunlight? I imagine your mood lifted the moment you were bathed in those intense, warm yellow rays. Seasonal Affective Disorder is a recognized problem in Psychia-
try where a person’s mood fluctuates with the different seasons. It is worse in the darker winter months and lighter when the days are long and the summer finally appears. Sometimes in medicine, the solution to a problem is a simple one. If some people’s mood is ‘light sensitive’ then why not add extra light during winter when the days are short and dark? This treatment is called Light Therapy and has been shown to
be very effective for sufferers of Seasonal Affective Disorder in a number of good quality clinical trials. There are a couple of tricks you should know before you try this at home. Most people use light therapy in the morning and are exposed to a bank of bright lights for about an hour each day. The other important detail is that these are not your regular fluorescent ceiling lights. They are much more powerful and therefore more expensive. We measure the ‘brightness’ of light in Lux units. The average lighting of an office is about 3-500 Lux. An overcast day will reach about 1000 Lux and a nice sunny day will pass 10,000 Lux, with ease. Light therapy uses lamps that emit at least 7500 Lux. Not as much illumination as a sunny day but clearly much more than the average artificial light.
Does Light Therapy work in people who don‘t have Seasonal Affective Disorder?
A Dutch trial of 89 older persons published in January 2011in
the prestigious Archives of General Psychiatry showed a 20% im- provement in depression symptoms after only three weeks of daily, 7500 Lux, Bright Light Therapy. The researchers also found that patients exposed to the bright lights were more awake in the morn- ings and had made significantly less amounts of a stress hormone called Cortisol.
I recommend regular physical activity to help elevate the mood
of my patients, for example walking 20 minutes daily in the sun. I also talk to them about using physical touch with animals, loved ones and connecting to friends to naturally raise endorphin levels and keep them there! The ancient Chinese art of Acupuncture is a subtle healing
form where needles are inserted at specific locations in the body in order to help the body’s own life force or “Chi” flow properly. It is ancient and extremely complex and I would not want to disrespect it by trying to simplify things into a single paragraph. Suffice it to say, that in my own practice, as a Medical Acupuncturist, I use both Acupuncture points on the body and the ears to help with Anxiety and Depression. The most recent review of the evidence for Acupuncture in the treatment of depression concluded that there was still “insufficient evidence” that it might indeed work. Having said that, I have found that with some of my patients there is definitely a positive response. I hope that after having read this article you can begin to see
how the integrative approach to the treatment of depression utilizes many different modalities at the same time. It is more than just pill popping. Combining Acupuncture, Light Therapy, Omega 3 supple- mentation and CBT together with the SSRI or SAMe, will get a better overall effect on the mood, for, as the old adage goes; ‘the sum of the parts is greater than the whole’.
Joseph Feuerstein MD is Director of Integrative Medicine at Stamford Hospital in Connecticut, and Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine at Columbia University College of Surgeons and Physicians in New York.
42 Natural Nutmeg June 2012
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