San-of-Son
A few years ago, special needs teacher Vegard Holum read an article about fatty acids on forskning.no. It has saved the health and schooling of hundreds of children, young people and adults.
As a teacher in an alternative school department, Vegard got a lot of theory and tired students into the classroom. As a trained carpenter and structural engineer, he was wired to find solutions that work in practice. Fate, in the form of some wise principals and cooperative parents, gave him the opportunity to explore how dietary changes could improve school life for some of the most vulnerable young people. One important step was to hammer fatty acids into the kids. Today, Vegard sells his own fatty acid test and fish oil, which has been developed on the advice and experience of the best professionals in research and clinical practice.
Optimal fatty acid balance as in the Stone Age
People who lived in the Stone Age are believed to have had an omega-6/3 balance of 1-2:1. Today, the average in Norway is estimated to be around 15:1. The nutrition authorities recommend a ratio of less than 5:1, while experts in the field of fat research recommend a level of less than 3 (1-2.5:1). A ratio of more than 2:1 is believed to trigger inflammatory reactions in the body and can lead to various symptoms and ailments.
The story started over twenty years ago, in 1990, when Vegard began teaching carpentry at Rud upper secondary school in Bærum. Here he taught both special and regular classes for two years and gained a good insight into how young people mastered their school work. At Rud, Vegard naturally met most normally functioning young people, but also many with a lower functional level. And with a low level of functioning often comes behavior that can be difficult for the teacher to deal with. "I had a classroom full of restless kids," he says.
In 1999, Vegard began an internship at Sollerudstranda School with the then headmaster Tor Hammer, who had worked with disadvantaged pupils for decades. Here, diet was an important part of the school day. Among other things, one of the student groups cooked for the others every day. Vegard gained inspiration and experience from this. He then received an offer from Enebakk municipality to start up an alternative school program from scratch for secondary school pupils who were in danger of dropping out of secondary school. Every year, 4-5 pupils just missed school, and the municipality wanted to catch these children. Vegard started to build up this department in 2001.
Discovering eating habits
- "One of the first things I noticed was that the eating habits of these pupils were a bit poor. He emphasizes the word "a bit", and it's all said with a smile: "No one brought a packed lunch, but everyone brought fifty bucks, and when the shops opened at ten o'clock, the students went out and came back with a bag of wheat buns and a litre and a half of cola. So it was obvious to beat them to the punch with an organized lunch. Since I didn't have any in-depth knowledge of nutrition at the time, it was the usual lunch of milk and bread, but minus sweet toppings. This worked relatively well. But the thing about these students was that they hadn't had breakfast either, so after a while I realized that I might as well give them breakfast when they arrived and then a lunch later in the day. This made it much easier for the pupils to learn, and much easier for their surroundings, as the children were calmer." - They were calmer from this food, then?
- "Yes, these kids were at the lowest level of need when it came to nutrition, so 'everything' helped. If it had been today, there would have been completely different food on the table ...
Discovering research
- We did this until 2005. That's when I found an article on forskning.no that Oxford University had published a study called "the Durham trial" in which the dietary supplement EyeQ was used to reduce AD/HD symptoms in children. I contacted my superiors and asked for permission to try out this supplement. The head teacher and head of school, the municipal doctor and public health nurses were all involved, and I got the go-ahead. In collaboration with the parents, we tried this on the children. Particularly in those children where we saw symptoms of lack of attention and concentration problems and a lot of impulsivity, we received feedback from parents that their sleep patterns had improved. "These are mostly children who fall asleep late, even if they go to bed early, and wake up during the night. When they then have to get up and go to school, it's difficult for them.
Discovering the dosage
At the same time, Vegard worked in a child welfare institution and at a drug clinic as an on-call substitute. In both places, he had the opportunity to recommend and try EyeQ, and saw that the supplement had a positive effect on several patients. "One day when I arrived at work at the drug clinic, one of the patients was delighted to tell me that if you doubled the dose, the effect was significantly better! Until then, they had been taking the dose used in the studies: 6 capsules daily, totaling 800 mg of omega-3 fatty acids. I was a bit scared and contacted the then product manager Terje Myrvold for EyeQ in Norway. Then I got in touch with professionals who could tell me that we were still on the safe side. After that, we gave 3-gram doses as standard (3 grams is the limit for considering omega-3 supplements as dietary supplements, above this it is considered a medicine, editor's note).
EPA/DHA, AA and eicosanoids
In the case of fatty acid deficiency, we should primarily supplement the fatty acids EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid) and DHA (docosahexaenoic acid). Eicosanoids are signaling molecules that are formed from fatty acids and have different functions depending on which fatty acids they are formed from. Eicosanoids formed from EPA counteract inflammation in the body, while eicosanoids from omega-6 fatty acids make the body more prone to inflammation.
DHA is the most common polyunsaturated fatty acid in the brain. However, research on depression, schizophrenia, AD/HD and dyslexia, among others, shows that it is not effective to add DHA when there is a deficiency, but that EPA must be added. This has been called "the brain's fatty acid paradox".
EPA prevents DHA and AA (omega-6 acid arachidonic acid) from detaching from the cell membrane, while EPA is converted to DHA. EPA precedes DHA in the conversion pathway of omega-3 fatty acids, which means that EPA can easily be converted to DHA when needed with normal enzyme function. Importantly, the abundant presence of EPA prevents the enzyme PLA2 (phospholipase A2) from releasing DHA and AA from the phospholipids (fatty acids linked to glycerol and a phosphate group), which otherwise regularly occurs and is difficult to prevent.
By using an oil that is high in EPA and low in DHA, a good balance between AA (arachidonic acid) and EPA is quickly achieved. To achieve a favorable AA/EPA balance, it is also important to avoid the use of omega-6-containing plant oils and plant margarines.
Not everyone will discover?
In 2008-2009, Vegard worked as a special education coordinator at a primary school in Vestby. Here he also tried to use fatty acids as a measure, but met a lot of resistance from colleagues. Although the feedback was good for most of the children they tried the supplement on, it is clear that nutritional measures can easily become controversial.
- The same thing happened at the drug clinic, but in reverse: The effect was so good for quite a few of the people we tried this on, that they wondered if they couldn't be given omega-3 fatty acids instead of drugs. This was discussed at a higher level outside the clinic. The result was that I was asked not to talk any more about omega-3, because the treatment offered was drug-assisted addiction treatment (LAR).
Back at the primary school in Vestby in 2008, Vegard arranged a seminar for the teachers in Vestby municipality and all the public health nurses with the fatty acid researcher Dr. Olle Haglund as speaker1. Attendance was poor, 30 people came, even though he had invited hundreds. But afterwards, the topic was picked up by special needs teacher Elin Natås in Son.
- A lady called! She wanted to know more about this and came to visit me at school. Vegard sits on the end of the chair, grinning and wagging, and I'm wondering if he's going to ask for a bone to chew on. The two of them had a long and pleasant chat during which Elin talked about how she worked with dietary changes for her pupils, and how she wanted to try fatty acids, but needed some information to get started. In this way, Vegard got in touch with a large network that was engaged in the importance of diet for children's learning and behavior.
Omega-3 fatty acids increase the need for antioxidants
Omega-3 fatty acids are chemically unstable and highly susceptible to oxidation or rancidity. Therefore, they must be protected by antioxidants. Especially with large intakes of omega-3 fatty acids, which we use to achieve a fatty acid balance, the body can be "depleted" of antioxidants. This means that some of the omega-3 fatty acids are destroyed before they have a chance to work inside the body. In this case, increasing the dose will not help; we get the opposite effect, namely the unfortunate effect of rancid fatty acids. That's why we need to find good antioxidants and balance their intake in relation to the intake of omega-3 fatty acids.
The facts first
With all the experience they had gained over the years, Vegard and his colleagues thought they had a good idea of what they were doing, until they got access to blood samples.
- Then we tested blood samples from Oil4Life for the first time. I took it on myself first. Since I was taking EyeQ in large doses (12 capsules, i.e. around 1.5 grams per day), I was absolutely sure that I was in balance at the Stone Age level, and that was that: I was sure that I had closer to a 1:1 than a 2:1 ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids. But I was sorely disappointed. When my first measurement showed 4.2:1, I realized that we had quite a lot to go on regarding the doses. I started to increase the dosage on myself to 16 capsules. I started recommending everyone who contacted me to measure themselves, and I also started to see what doses were actually needed to achieve a fatty acid balance that was considered optimal. - Then I got an invitation to a seminar with Oil4Life and came into contact with many people working in the field. Then I learned something important: That in order to achieve the optimal balance, we had to take oil on a spoon, not in capsules, to get enough! In the summer of 2011, Vegard received an invitation to work with Oil4Life. They hired him for six months to write technical texts, give lectures and sell. He then tried their oils. This oil has a 2:1 ratio of EPA:DHA (see box).
- By taking supplements and measuring with blood tests, I now found the doses needed to achieve an optimal balance: Around 25 ml (2 large tablespoons).
Palmitoleic acid (PS, 16:1Ω7)
The San Analyse fatty acid test measures, among other things, the interesting palmitoleic acid. Palmitoleic acid is a monounsaturated fatty acid that the body can make from glucose via the synthesis of palmitic acid (C16:0), but it can also be supplied via food. PS protects, strengthens and renews mucosal cells. Healthy mucous membranes allow nutrients to pass through without bacteria and viruses.
Other monounsaturated fatty acids include caproic acid (10:1) and oleic acid (18:1) - the latter is abundant in olive oil, avocado and animal fats.
Marker for carbohydrate intolerance
PS is associated with insulin function and has been shown to be an important indicator of insulin resistance, i.e. when muscle and fat cells absorb less glucose and insulin levels increase. PS increases rapidly when the body converts glucose to fatty acids. According to Volek and Phinney, a high level of PS in the blood is an indication of excessive carbohydrate intake and obesity.
Two reasons for high PS values:
- Too high a proportion of carbohydrates in the diet.
- Metabolic change in the body: The prevalence of insulin resistance and thus less tolerance to carbohydrates increases with age.
Optimal values
There is no optimal value for PS. The level varies greatly from person to person, but measurements show values of 1-10% of the total fatty acids in the body for people with the same diet. According to Stephen Phinney, the value for people with stable blood sugar levels ranges from 0.5% downwards.
PS provides important information when the same person is measured regularly. An increase in the POA level usually means that the body is handling sugar (glucose) poorly, which may indicate that it is beneficial to reduce the amount of carbohydrates in the diet.
Best when you do it yourself?
However, what Vegard missed with Oil4Life oil was the immediate and good effect that he was used to from EyeQ, for example that sleep came quickly and that chronic inflammation quickly disappeared. At the end of 2011, he was asked by Joakim Graff, CEO of Itogha Norge AS, which distributed Oil4Life in Norway, if he could compose an oil himself.
- Then I had some thoughts about how it could be as good as possible in terms of meaning: Provide the best therapeutic effect. I wanted to use a fish oil with a high EPA content and a low DHA content, as we find in EyeQ. Then I would remove the evening primrose oil that EyeQ uses, since evening primrose oil can have negative effects in high doses. Evening primrose oil is added to many omega-3 products, but the blood tests show us that perhaps only one in three people need it. This is due to differences in the function of the enzyme that converts LA (linoleic acid) to GLA (gamma linolenic acid). I kept the principle of using polyphenols (a group of antioxidants in plants) from olive oil as an antioxidant because olive oil has properties that are particularly good at protecting the omega-3 fatty acids in the body. (High intake of polyunsaturated fatty acids increases the need for antioxidants in the body).
This new oil was called San Omega-3 Total, and the feedback from customers matched the manufacturers' expectations: That the oil works quickly on inflammation and sleep and those conditions related to steroid hormone balance and pain in the body. Customers report fast and good effects: The "brain fog" is turned off, those struggling with sleep fall asleep, and those with chronic inflammation get rid of it.
- It is important to emphasize that these effects are in addition to all the conditions where omega-3 fatty acids are important!
But be careful with the doses: 2 tablespoons (above the legal recommendation for dietary supplements) immediately helps to bring you into hormonal balance.
...and then came the test.
The final step was to find a suitable method for taking blood samples. Vegard and Joakim did this in collaboration with the fatty acid laboratory Omegametrix in Munich. In addition to fatty acid balance and omega-3 index (the amount of omega-3 out of the total amount of fatty acids in the blood), this test also measures trans fatty acids and an omega-7 fatty acid that indicates insulin levels in the body.
- What has led me to believe that my recipe is relatively useful is the experience with EyeQ, which has been documented in five studies. In addition, several studies have been conducted on other high-EPA oils. However, many of the studies have been done on so-called EPA ethyl esters, where the DHA component has been completely removed (which means that you can clearly see what effect EPA has in the body). This has been done by researchers David Horrobin and Malcolm Peet, among others. When they developed and patented their Kirunal oil, a fish oil high in EPA and low in DHA (mixed with GLA from evening primrose oil), it was to find the natural oil that provided the best treatment effect, especially in the mental (cognitive) area.
What further distinguishes San oil from other fatty acid products: - It's expensive to make because I buy the most expensive raw materials. But it's cheaper on the market because there are no sophisticated links or fancy marketing between the Pacific fish oil and the warehouse in Son.
"Carpenters aren't so concerned with snobbish things like that. Carpenters want to find something that works.
Vegard Holum
Vegard Holum (born 1962): Trained as a vocational teacher in construction and has a master's degree in special education. Took PPU (practical pedagogical education) at Stabekk in 1999-2000, continued with special education in 2000-2001. He has worked as a construction teacher, been head of Prosjekthuset - an alternative school initiative in Enebakk municipality, special education coordinator at a primary school in Vestby municipality, OT coordinator in the follow-up service and has been on-call in various child welfare institutions and at Åsenheten, an institution in substance abuse care. He now works in adult psychiatry as an environmental therapist. He also runs the company San Helse AS, which sells the fatty acid test San Analyse and fish oil San Omega-3.
