Oils in Diet

Oils are calorie-dense and as such can rapidly increase the calorie content for any food. So which oils have properties that are helpful and properties that aren't helpful?  And then, what is helpful and what isn't?

Oils that cause inflammation are not helpful.  Inflammation is the body's natural response to help it heal, so what is the body healing from when we consume an oil that causes inflammation?  No idea, but if we are consuming oils that cause inflammation daily we can be putting the body into a chronically inflamed state.  If the gut is inflamed absorption of nutrients is affected and ALS patients have huge, huge, huge nutrient absorption issues.  The body's ability to get rid of toxins through the liver is compromised, and toxic overload in the liver compromises mitochondria function and in ALS there's a problem with the mitochondria.

This article, http://authoritynutrition.com/6-reasons-why-vegetable-oils-are-toxic/, gives 6 reasons to not consume processed seed oils like soybean oil, sunflower oil, corn oil, canola oil, cottonseed oil, and safflower oil, and inflammation is one of them.  The six reasons are: 1) unnatural in large amounts, 2) mess up fatty acid composition of the body, 3) inflammation, 4) loaded with trans fat, 5) increased risk of cardivascular disease, 6) associated with other diseases.

The omega 6/omega 3 ratio is also affected by oil choices.  The importance of the omega6/omega 3 ratio, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12442909, can not be understated.  ALS is an autoimmune disease and a high ratio helps to promote autoimmune diseases.  Inflammation compromises nutrient absorption, and there is inflammation with a high omega 6/omega 3 ratio.  An omega6/omega3 ratio of 2/1 or 3/1 suppresses inflammation.  Dig deeper, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2835780/, and you can find that inflammation is also associated with protein catabolism, which is muscle tissue breakdown, another huge problem with ALS.

Coconut oil has a high concentration of medium-chain triglycerides.  With ALS, the mitochondria are not working properly and are not properly delivering energy to the cells, a part of the process that is leading to cell death.  These medium-length triglycerides provide energy that cells can use through the ketosis process.  Coconut oil also has other benefits (http://www.antiaginganswers.net/healthyfats.html):

Approximately 50% of the fatty acids in coconut fat are lauric acide. Lauric acid is a medium-chain fatty acid, which has the additional beneficial function of being formed into monolaurin in the human or animal body. Monolaurin is the anti-viral, antibacterial, and antiprotozoal monoglyceride used by the muman or animal to destroy lipid coated viruses such as HIV, herpes, cytomegalovirus, influenza, various pathogenic bacteria including Listeria monocytogenes and Heliobacter pylori, and protozoa such as Giaradia lambia. Some studies have also shown some antimicrobial effects of the free lauric acid.

Immunity boosting is an added benefit of coconut oil.

Olive oil's omega 6/omega3 ratio is an unfavourable 13:1, but it actually has anti-inflammatory properties because of other components in it. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21443487.  You need both kinds of fatty acids, it is just the more 6s you have the more 3s you need to balance them.

Oils to avoid - omega 6:3

• soybean oil  - 6:1 
• sunflower oil - no omega 3
• corn oil - no omega 3
• canola oil - 2.5:1
• cottonseed oil - no omega 3
• safflower oil - no omega 3

Oils to consider

• coconut oil - no omega 3
• flaxseed oil - 0.3:1
• olive oil - 13:1

Walnuts are the highest omega 3 nut, and krill is the best source of omega 3.

All articles are a work in progress and are advisory for the reasons given.  Everyone should do their own research to verify or refute and make their own decisions about whether they think it is helpful or not.