[tri-med] EFA

EFA 
A very quick spiel about EFA.
EFA is our friend around here - and while its used for many reasons we use it 
for praxis and I personally think all tri-ers should be on it once they hit the 
12 month mark.
EFA stands for Essential Fatty Acids, also known as Omega's, long chain fatty 
acids, good fats and so on.

I started using it long before it became trendy after I researched the work of 
Jacqueline Stordy and also autopsy reports of babies with T-18.

Autopsy reports on the brains of babies with T-18 (sorry if I am upsetting 
anyone who has an angel) show that children with T-18 often have poor 
myelination of the brain. Myelin is the sheath that covers the nerves. Its the 
myelin that conducts the messages down the nerves. 

Lack of myelin, or more accurately the loss of myelin is what you see in 
Multiple Sclerosis. If you are missing myelin then the message through gets 
disrupted. 

I believe (and its my own personal belief) that most if not all of our kids 
suffer from praxis in some form or another and that the effects of praxis can 
be taken as retardation (if you cant get the message from your brain to your 
muscles then you can't differentiate between whether the brain can or can't) I 
am NOT saying that our kids are not cognitively disabled - just that they may 
seem more so than they are.

Back to EFA's
I believe that EFA's encourage the myelination of the nerves. They cannot test 
specifically to see if thats the case in people (because it would mean taking 
brain samples which you can't ethically do) but testing in mice says yes it 
does. And outcome research says yes too. Thats Jacqueline Stordy's work - she 
has shown great benefits in EFA's with conditions such as oral motor dyspraxia 
and ADD, ADDHD. All conditions associated with poor myelination.

Over recent years Dr. Stordy's work has been validated by her peers time and 
time again - to the stage where the US FDA now adds EFA's to many infant 
formulas. 

Personally I would like to see a branch out study to see if Tri'ers on EFA's 
suffer less apneas, walk earlier etc.

The reason I said 12 months earlier is that most EFA's that you get over the 
counter are made from fish - which is a high allergy risk. So you can start 
earlier just do it under the guidance of a ped and start with plant based EFA's.

Personally we use Efalex, which I understand is not available in the US 
anymore. Jude can tell you the US substitutes. Efalex is the one Dr Stordy 
developed and has the right blend of Omega, 3's, 6's and 9's. 

The most obvious benefit to Alex from EFA's was his talking (his lack of speech 
was a praxis issue) and he still takes it to aid in concentration. 

Even if you don't want to use EFA's don't short change babies on fats - they 
need them.

"I wanted a perfect ending. Now I've learned, the hard way, that some poems 
don't rhyme, and some stories don't have a clear beginning, middle, and end. 
Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the 
best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next. Delicious ambiguity."
- Gilda Radner -

Keep Looking For Rainbows!!
   _--_|\
 /Karen \
 \ _.--._ /
          v Karen, Mum to Alex (8 years, T-18 Mosaic)
http://members.optushome.com.au/karens


                  Building ___ooOOoo__ Rainbows
                       www.trisomyonline.org
                  Families Helping Families On-line

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