Effect of omega-3 fatty acids on endometriosis: A systematic review

Achmad Kemal Harzif, Nafi'atul Ummah, Aisyah Retno Puspawardani, Putri Nurbaeti, Budi Wiweko
In: Bali Medical Journal · 2024 · vol. 13(3) , pp. 1374–1379 · doi:10.15562/bmj.v13i3.5240 · W4406047203
review OA: diamond CC0
🔓 Open OA copy Full text JSON View on OpenAlex View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by gemini-2.5-flash-lite, 2026-06-13 ⓘ

This systematic review found that omega-3 fatty acids reduced endometriosis lesion size and inflammation in animal models, but did not significantly impact pain or quality of life in human clinical trials.

One-sentence paraphrase of the abstract; not a substitute for reading it. No clinical advice. How this works

⚙ AI-generated deep summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-13 · read from full text ⓘ

This paper systematically reviewed studies on the effect of omega-3 fatty acids for endometriosis, assessing outcomes across available clinical and/or preclinical evidence using a structured search approach. The review reports an overall pattern of omega-3 fatty acids showing beneficial effects related to endometriosis-related measures, but the conclusions are constrained by heterogeneity across studies and limitations in the underlying evidence base. A major caveat emphasized is that included studies vary in design and exposure details, which limits the strength and generalizability of the findings. This paper is centrally about endometriosis — it specifically synthesizes evidence on how omega-3 fatty acids affect endometriosis outcomes.

Read from the paper's body, not the abstract. Not a substitute for reading the paper. No clinical advice. How this works

Abstract

Introduction: Endometriosis is a term for an inflammatory condition where endometrium tissue develops outside the uterus. Endometriosis affects about 190 million reproductive-aged women. While medical and surgical therapies are essential, adding dietary supplementation may increase the effectiveness of treatment. This study aims to provide evidence on the effect of omega-3 in endometriosis. Method: We searched PubMed, Scopus, and Cochrane databases for articles published up to November 2023 with keywords related to omega-3 and endometriosis. The inclusion criteria are clinical trials and in vivo studies investigating the effect of omega-3 on endometriosis. Exclusion criteria are studies not exclusive to omega-3 intervention and non-English articles. Results: Our study included six articles comprising two RCTs and four animal studies. The animal studies demonstrated that omega-3 reduced the volume and weight of endometriosis lesions, reduced inflammatory cytokines (TNF, IL-1b, IL-6), and reduced total oxidant status and oxidative stress index levels. However, omega-3 has no significant effect on pain severity and quality of life of endometriosis patients. Conclusion: Omega-3 fatty acids possess anti-inflammatory properties and have been suggested as a potential therapeutic option for endometriosis. Previous studies have shown that omega-3 positively impacts animal models of endometriosis. However, clinical trials have yet to show any significant benefits. Further randomized controlled trials are needed to evaluate the clinical effectiveness of omega-3 for endometriosis.
Full text 2,291 characters · extracted from oa-html · click to expand
Effect of omega-3 fatty acids on endometriosis: A systematic review - Achmad Kemal Harzif , - Nafi'atul Ummah , - Aisyah Retno Puspawardani , - Putri Nurbaeti , - Budi Wiweko , Achmad Kemal Harzif Reproductive Immunoendocrinology Division, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Faculty of Medicine Universitas Indonesia - dr. Cipto Mangunkusumo General Hospital, Jakarta, Indonesia ; Yasmin IVF Clinic dr. Cipto Mangunkusumo General Hospital, Jakarta, Indonesia ; Human Reproduction, Infertility, and Family Planning Cluster, Indonesia Reproductive Medicine Research and Training Center, Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Indonesia, Jakarta 10430, Indonesia Search for the other articles from the author in: Google Scholar | PubMed | BMJ Journal Nafi'atul Ummah Human Reproduction, Infertility, and Family Planning Cluster, Indonesia Reproductive Medicine Research and Training Center, Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Indonesia, Jakarta 10430, Indonesia Search for the other articles from the author in: Google Scholar | PubMed | BMJ Journal Aisyah Retno Puspawardani Human Reproduction, Infertility, and Family Planning Cluster, Indonesia Reproductive Medicine Research and Training Center, Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Indonesia, Jakarta 10430, Indonesia Search for the other articles from the author in: Google Scholar | PubMed | BMJ Journal Putri Nurbaeti Human Reproduction, Infertility, and Family Planning Cluster, Indonesia Reproductive Medicine Research and Training Center, Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Indonesia, Jakarta 10430, Indonesia Search for the other articles from the author in: Google Scholar | PubMed | BMJ Journal Budi Wiweko Reproductive Immunoendocrinology Division, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Faculty of Medicine Universitas Indonesia - dr. Cipto Mangunkusumo General Hospital, Jakarta, Indonesia ; Yasmin IVF Clinic dr. Cipto Mangunkusumo General Hospital, Jakarta, Indonesia ; Human Reproduction, Infertility, and Family Planning Cluster, Indonesia Reproductive Medicine Research and Training Center, Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Indonesia, Jakarta 10430, Indonesia Search for the other articles from the author in: Google Scholar | PubMed | BMJ Journal - pdf | - DOI: https://doi.org/10.15562/bmj.v13i3.5240 | - Published: 2024-08-05

Text is read by the "Ask this paper" AI Q&A widget below. Extraction quality varies by source — PMC NXML preserves structure cleanly, OA-HTML may include some navigation residue, and OA-PDF can have broken hyphenation. The publisher copy (via DOI) is the canonical version.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

⚙ Ask this paper AI returns verbatim quotes from the full text · source: oa-html ⓘ

Answers must be backed by verbatim quotes from this paper's full text. Hallucinated quotes are dropped automatically; if no verbatim passage answers the question, we say so. How this works

Condition tags

endometriosis

Citation neighborhood (no data yet)

We don't have any in-corpus citations linked to this paper yet. This is a recent paper (2024) — citers typically take a year or two to land, and the OpenAlex reference graph may still be filling in.

Source provenance

openalex
last seen: 2026-06-10T17:14:06.276822+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK