A dietitian's take on 3 health headlines that are buzzing right now

SALT LAKE CITY — When KSL Health Contributor Miki Eberhardt takes notice, we pay attention, too!

She shared three health headlines you should know about.

"I'm trained to dive into what the study is rather than just hear it in the headline and believe it," she explained.

Are Omega-3 Supplements Actually Good for Your Brain?

For years, omega-3 supplements have been promoted as a support for brain health, especially as people age.

"We know that when blood levels of omega-3 are high… that is good for overall brain," Eberhardt explained.

But recent findings have surprised many researchers.

"Even though they're giving older adults supplements, they're not seeing the improvement in memory or in brain structure," she noted.

That doesn't mean omega-3s are completely ineffective. The new findings raise questions about how supplementation specifically affects cognitive health.

"Food is actually gonna be more important than the supplementation," Eberhardt emphasized.

She recommended focusing on foods naturally rich in omega-3s instead of just going for the supplements.

"If we can get in the fatty fish, the chia seeds, the flax seeds… that might be better overall," she explained.

She also pointed out that omega-3s still have proven benefits in other areas.

"We know it's good for heart health," she said. "It's good for a lot of things that we have seen proven."

Do Intense Workouts Spike My Cortisol?

Another health topic floating around social media is cortisol, often referred to as the body's stress hormone.

"If you've been online in the past decade, you know that cortisol is the villain of the internet," Eberhardt said.

It's blamed for burnout, inflammation, weight gain and a long list of other health complaints. Many wellness influencers tell people to avoid high-intensity exercise because it can temporarily increase cortisol levels. But Eberhardt said the science is more nuanced than that. One of the biggest misconceptions is that any increase in cortisol is harmful.

"An intense workout will make your cortisol go up, which is natural and normal," she explained. "It's providing oxygen for your muscles."

Those elevated levels don't stay high forever. Exercise is still important for overall health, even if it temporarily raises cortisol.

"Over time, it will drop back down, actually often below what the baseline was," Eberhardt explained.

The real issue isn't the workout itself. It's what happens afterward.

"The key here… is recovery, rest, sleep and fueling your body properly," she emphasized.

Without those things, intense exercise can become more stressful on the body. But when you prioritize recovery, you can actually lower cortisol.

"Recovery, rest, sleep, and fueling your body properly will lower cortisol overall more than anything else," Eberhardt said.

The Placebo Effect That Works Even If You Know It's Fake

Researchers in Italy divided healthy older adults into three groups. One group received no intervention. Another group received a placebo, but was told it was a performance-enhancing supplement. A third group received the same placebo but was explicitly told it was a placebo. Then the researchers measured how participants performed during a training program. Eberhardt explained that the participants who believed they were taking a real supplement increased their performance overall by 7%. But, the group that knew it was fake increased by 9%.

"The takeaway there for me is as we age, there is power in our overall mindset and our own self-belief in what we're capable of doing," she said.

Even when the participants knew they weren't getting a real treatment, simply engaging in the process and believing improvement was possible seemed to have influenced their outcomes.

Find more advice from Miki Eberhardt on Instagram, @nutritionbymiki.

This story was adapted from a TV broadcast script using artificial intelligence. Every story, including those adapted with AI, is reviewed by a human editor before publication to ensure that KSL's editorial standards are upheld.