Consuming fatty foods before surgery could have negative effects on memory.
- Consuming fatty foods a few days before surgery would cause an inflammatory response in the brain.
- This can have negative effects on memory.
- Taking omega-3 food supplements could limit the risks.
Eating too much fat is generally not recommended: it increases the risk of being overweight, diabetes and associated illnesses. During certain periods, it is particularly important to avoid this type of diet. According to a study published in the journal Brain, Behavior, and Immunity, a high-fat diet a few days before surgery can trigger brain inflammation. This can affect cognitive functions, including memory.
High-fat diet: worsening inflammation after surgery
“We have shown that an unhealthy diet, even in the short term, especially when consumed close to a surgical procedure, which in itself will cause an inflammatory response, can have adverse consequences.develops Ruth Barrientos, main author of this study. The high-fat diet alone may increase inflammation in the brain a bit, but if you then have surgery that has the same effect, you get a synergistic response that can then lead to a longer-term memory problem. term.” The scientist and her colleagues came to this conclusion after conducting a study on rats.
A study on rats to understand the effects of a fatty diet before surgery
For three days, researchers fed young, adult, and old rats a diet high in saturated fat. Next, the lab animals underwent a procedure similar to exploratory abdominal surgery: previous studies have shown that this act can cause cognitive problems for up to a week in an aged brain.
For the aged rats in this study, the combination of a high-fat diet and surgery resulted in problems with contextual memory and fear memory, linked to the amygdala, that persisted for at least two weeks. . The authors succeeded in identifying an immune system receptor, called TLR4, responsible for brain inflammatory reactions and memory disorders, linked to surgery and diet.
“What this tells us in older animals, along with the fact that we see the same impairment in young animals after a high-fat diet and surgery, is that fear memory is particularly vulnerable to the effects of diet. And we don’t know whywarns Ruth Barrientos. We hope in the future to understand the vulnerability of the amygdala to these unhealthy eating problems.”
Surgery: omega-3 prevents harmful effects on the brain
But the scientist and her team have already succeeded in identifying a way to prevent these effects on inflammation. By blocking the TLR4 signaling pathway, through omega-3 supplementation, it is possible to prevent the neuroimmune reaction and avoid memory problems. The authors observed that taking a DHA omega-3 fatty acid dietary supplement for one month before an unbalanced diet and surgery prevented the memory effects associated with both overeating and overeating. ‘surgical intervention. DHA is particularly present in fish and seafood.It’s incrediblerejoices Ruth Barrientos. This really suggests that this could be a potential pretreatment, especially if people know they are going to have surgery and their diet is unhealthy.”
