Fish oil contains essential fatty acids that promote mental, physical and emotional health. Your body can't synthesize these nutrients, so you must obtain them from food sources. While humans evolved with a diet consisting of a balance of omega-6 fatty acids and omega-3 fatty acids, Western diets tend to provide 15 or 16 times the amount of omega-6 as omega-3 fatty acids. This imbalance causes your immune system to promote inflammatory responses, which contributes to joint pain. Supplemental fish oil can restore a more healthy balance of omega-3 to omega-6 fatty acids. Therefore, far from causing joint pain, fish oil generally reduces joint pain.
Causes of Joint Pain
Joint pain afflicts a significant number of people. More than 20 percent of American adults have arthritis, reports the Arthritis Foundation. As you age, you become more vulnerable to osteoarthritis, a condition in which the cartilage that covers the bones of your joints deteriorates, allowing bone to scrape against bone whenever you move. In rheumatoid arthritis, your body's immune system errantly attacks and destroys lubricating synovial membrane within your joints. Many other conditions can cause joint pain, including ankylosing spondylitis, gout, lupus, tendinitis, bursitis, fibromyalgia, Reiter's syndrome, carpal tunnel syndrome and scleroderma. In each of these syndromes, an overaggressive, inflammatory immune system response can contribute to the amount of pain you experience.
Treatment of Joint Pain
You can always take nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs such as ibuprofen, or analgesics such as aspirin, to reduce inflammation and pain. But these medicines have side effects, including the destruction of your cartilage, according to the New Hope website. Many people with joint pain restrict their movement. However, this strategy not only limits your mobility, but also can hasten the deterioration of your condition; usually, movement is painful but therapeutic. Though there are no magic bullets, muting your immune system's inflammatory response through naturalistic means can promote healing of damaged tissues and reduce your pain.
Cooling Your Joints
Omega-3 fatty acids in fish oil and fish oil supplements function like ibuprofen, but instead of causing adverse side effects, fish oil offers a slew of health benefits from decreasing your risk of cardiovascular disease to increasing your mood. For example, a 2002 study published in "Arthritis & Rheumatism" found that patients with rheumatoid arthritis who took high doses of fish oil for eight weeks reported fewer tender joints, less morning stiffness and had lower ratings of pain and arthritis activity compared to patients who took a placebo. Joseph Maroon, M.D., examined the use of fish oil as an alternative to nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs in a 2006 study published in "Surgical Neurology." He found that 59 percent of his patients reported decreased joint pain. Nearly 70 percent stopped using non-steroidal anti-inflammatories. Few patients had side effects and most intended to continue to use fish oil. Rheumatologist Leslie Cleland advises that it can take two to three months for the anti-inflammatory benefits of fish oil to develop. Most studies of the anti-inflammatory benefits of fish oil typically administer 3 to 5 mg of fish oil per day.
Side Effects
The question remains as to whether fish oil can potentially cause joint pain for some people. The Mayo Clinic notes that certain side effects can occur with fish oil, including arm, back or jaw pain, chest pain or tightness, nausea, shortness of breath, sweating and nausea. Consult with your doctor immediately if you experience these side effects. Other side effects are less common and less serious, including belching, chills, diarrhea, gas, headaches, loss of appetite, lower back or side pain, muscle pain, sweating, trouble sleeping, fatigue or tiredness and last, but not least, joint pain. These side effects most likely are temporary responses as your body adjusts to the infusion of omega-3 fatty acids. Give yourself some time to adjust, but speak with your doctor if the side effects persist.
References
- "Arthritis Research & Therapy; Fish Oil: What the Prescriber Needs to Know; Leslie Cleland, et al.; 2006
- "Arthritis & Rheumatism"; Effects of High-Dose Fish Oil on Rheumatoid Arthritis After Stopping Nonsteroid Anti-inflammatory Drugs Clinical and Immune Correlates; Joel Kremer, et al., Dec 9, 2005
- "Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapie"; The Importance of the Ratio of Omega-6/Omega-3 Essential Fatty Acids; Artemis Simopoulos; October 2002
- Mayo Clinic: Omega-3-Acid Ethyl Esters (Oral Route)
- New Hope: Chronic Joint Pain
- "Surgical Neurology"; Omega-3 Fatty Acids (Fish Oil) as an Anti-Inflammatory: An Alternative to Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory Drugs for Discogenic Pain
