The right quantity of DHA for children with developmental delay and for brain growth
- 200 mg DHA/100 mg EPA per 5 ml to ideally stimulate the developing brain.
- Ideal Quantity > Affordable Price (INR 549 per bottle)
Numerous LC-PUFA supplementation trials in preterm infants which have reported greater visual acuity following enhanced dietary DHA relative to placebo (Birch et al., 1992; Carlson et al., 1993; Smithers et al., 2008b).
Similarly, numerous RCTs in preterm populations have found that DHA supplementation positively affects neurocognitive outcomes including language comprehension (O’Connor et al., 2001), memory (Henriksen et al., 2008) and mental and psychomotor development (Clandinin et al., 2005).
Evidence that infant DHA supplementation conveys significant benefit on visual acuity – review of 12 clinical studies from the Harvard School of Public Health (SanGiovanni et al., 2000).
Increased dietary DHA improved visual acuity in term infants at two and four months of age – SanGiovanni et al. (2000)
Healthy term infants (n = 287) were randomized to either very high dose fish oil (incorporating >250 mg DHA plus 60 mg EPA) or placebo (olive oil) per day from birth.
The study found that scores for later developing gestures and total number of gestures were significantly higher in the fish oil group at both 12 and 18 months. These are associated with visual recognition memory, deferred imitation and turn-taking skills (Heimann et al., 2006). They predict language and communicative ability in later life (Acredolo and Goodwyn, 1988).
The concentration of DHA within women’s breast milk appear to be decreasing over time (Makrides et al., 1995). ~60 mg of DHA per day for the first 6 months postnatally, assuming an average breast milk intake of 750 mL per day (Cunnane et al., 2000).
