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Evidence for Enteric Coated Fish Oil (vs. Non-Enteric Coated) and Colitis?

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Ulcerative Colitis
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Posted 12/12/2011 4:50 AM (GMT 0)
Does anyone have references to research supporting the use of enteric coated fish oil, instead of non-enteric coated, for treatment and maintenance of remission in colitis?

I see studies on Crohn's disease with enteric-coated fish oil, but not for colitis. Or at least it's not clear to me in the studies I've found for fish oil and colitis how the fish oil was delivered.

Thanks.
Posted 12/12/2011 9:56 AM (GMT 0)
I am not aware of any research on enteric-coated fish oil and UC. Here's an analysis of various studies of omega-3s and IBD, that suggests that enteric-coated pills warrant further studies.

http://www.ajcn.org/content/82/3/611.full.pdf+html
Posted 12/12/2011 7:08 PM (GMT 0)
Correct me if I am wrong, my understanding of enteric coating is just to avoid that fishy belching afterwards. AFAIK, there is no benefit of enteric coating to IBD as such. Could you please cite some papers studying enteric coated vs regular fish oils in Crohn's. What do they conclude (and who has funded those studies)?
Posted 1/2/2012 11:47 AM (GMT 0)
The link that ahnadlass1 already provided in the post above refers to a study on Crohn's disease that found enteric coated fish oil supplements beneficial. Some people speculate that the benefit seen in Crohn's disease might also apply to colitis, but as far as I can tell it hasn't been studied. So that's why I was asking if anyone knew of any studies with colitis and enteric coated fish oil.

That aside, it's also true that the studies for the benefits of fish oil for colitis are pretty contradictory. Some studies claim there are no benefits at all.

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17636844
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2109004

Other studies seem to indicate some benefit. But, as my original post asked, I was just wondering if there was any evidence of enteric coated fish oil benefiting colitis, since it has been studied with Crohn's disease.

There is this study which found that direct contact between fish oil and colitis tissue had a benefit in a culture medium, which I suppose might suggest that the enteric coated capsules are better because they might deliver the fish oil more directly to the colon (but this is just my speculation). See:

www.wjgnet.com/1007-9327/11/7466.asp
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