Back to: Introduction to Evidence Synthesis

First up, omega-3 fatty acids and cardiovascular health:

Question: Should you take omega-3 fatty acids to prevent strokes, heart attacks or other cardiovascular diseases?*

You’re probably familiar with omega-3 fatty acids. You can find them in foods such as salmon, flax seeds, and walnuts, but they’re often taken as supplements in the form of those golden colored fish oil pills. How do omega-3 fatty acids improve our health? If you look online, you can find claims that they do everything from decrease the spread of breast cancer to treat mental illness.

The Center for Evidence Synthesis in Health (CESH) conducted a systematic review to examine one of these claims: do omega-3 fatty acids reduce the risk of strokes, heart attacks and other cardiovascular diseases?

*Of course, researchers would phrase this question in more precise, scientific language. To express the overall intent of this systematic review, we’ll use colloquial language. For information about how to construct an effective research question, see our course on PICO(D).