Does Omega-3 Fatty Acid Supplementation Have Beneficial Effects on Plasma Homocysteine, Insulin Resistance and Lipid Profile of Type 2 Diabetic Patients? A Randomized Clinical Trial

Background: this study was conducted to determine the effects of n-3 pufas supplementation on plasma homocysteine (hcy) level, lipid profile and insulin resistance in patients with type 2 diabetes (t2d). methods: this study is a double-blind controlled trial involving 70 patients with t2d selected from yazd diabetes research center in 2013. patients were randomly assigned to receive either 2 g/day omega-3 soft gels (og) or 2 g/day placebo (pg) for 6 weeks. at the beginning and end of the study, hcy concentration, fasting plasma glucose (fbg), fasting plasma insulin, total cholesterol (tc), triglycerides (tg), low density lipoprotein cholesterol (ldl-c), high density lipoprotein cholesterol (hdl-c), hdl-c/ldl-c ratio, insulin resistance (homa-ir), insulin sensitivity (is) and beta-cell function were measured and compared. results: sixty five participants completed the study. the results of this study showed that omega-3 fatty acid supplementation caused significant increase in hcy (p = 0.007) and ldlc (p = 0.02), while hdlc and hdlc/ldlc ratio were significantly decreased (p = 0.001 and 0.006, respectively). in both groups, insulin and homa-ir were increased, while is decreased significantly. βeta-cell function was increased only in og (p = 0.005). there was no significant difference in mean change of any factors. conclusion: the present study found no beneficial effects of 2 g/day omega-3 supplement for 6 weeks on biomarkers of hcy, fbg, insulin and lipid profile in th t2d patients.