Multi-Vitamins: Effective or Placebo?

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dubyugh
dubyugh Posts: 19
in Food and Nutrition
I could really use your perspective on this matter. I've been reading a lot of conflicting stories. What is your experience using Multi-Vitamins? Should I be taking one? Are they a waste of money?

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  • jayjay12345654321
    jayjay12345654321 Posts: 653 Member
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    You better absorb nutrients from natural sources, but if you're falling short, a multi-vitamin doesn't hurt to bridge the gap.
  • Hadabetter
    Hadabetter Posts: 942 Member
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    Waste of money unless you have a vitamin deficiency, which you should not if you have a balanced diet. However, if you are a vegetarian you will need some B vitamin supplements, and possibly iron too if you are a pre-menopausal woman.
  • Joreanasaurous
    Joreanasaurous Posts: 1,384 Member
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    Eh. I eat a healthy well rounded diet, but enjoy taking a vitamin just in case I fall short as a safetly precaution.
  • jbee27
    jbee27 Posts: 356 Member
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    I've seen every opinion under the sun voiced on this topic on MFP...some people think that they are garbage, others swear by them. Go with what makes the most sense to you, and perhaps consult your doctor.

    Personally, I take a multivitamin and Vitamin D everyday with my lunch, as it's what my MD recomended. I feel pretty good, it's helped my iron count (high enough to donate blood now, which was never the case before), and I've actually noticed that my nails grow a long faster and stronger since I've started taking them...not a health benefit per se, but a nice side effect!
  • michael300891
    michael300891 Posts: 275
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    Stay away from them unless you are on an extremely restrictive diet. Several vitamins such as vitamin E taken on a daily basis actually correlate to increased mortality and have never been evidenced to improve performance as some broscientists suggest. Also, many vitamins act as anti-oxidants. Many people will give you the classic story about how oxidative damage causes cancer/death etc and anti-oxidants prevent this. What they forget to mention is that your body has its own antioxidant systems such as the glutathione peroxidase system and providing excessive antioxidants from food reduces your bodys own systems not to mention inhibits training adaptation.... These are the recent findings over the last decade that have consistently suggested against the use of multi-vitamins...

    Many of the vitamins included in a typical supplement wont be a problem and some are potentially good: Vitamin D as someone suggested above has actually a moderate amount of scientific evidence to support its use.

    However, theres just no point going near a generic multi-vit unless your an anorexic or clinical patient.
  • arrseegee
    arrseegee Posts: 575 Member
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    Effective if you have a vitamin deficiency. If you're not deficient then it's just expensive urine.
  • Hornsby
    Hornsby Posts: 10,322 Member
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    http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/what-should-you-eat/vitamins/
  • fitformidlife
    fitformidlife Posts: 103
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    This is a good question for your doctor. I'm approaching age 50 and just had comprehensive blood work done. It showed that I need more vitamin D and Omega-3, so I've started supplements for both of those. I don't think there's any sure way to tell unless you actually have the blood work done.
  • michael300891
    michael300891 Posts: 275
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    http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/what-should-you-eat/vitamins/

    Dispise this line "A daily multivitamin is an inexpensive nutrition insurance policy. Try to take one every day."

    The same post also warns that too much can be a bad thing? And that their not really needed unless your deficient?

    It baffles me that articles like that can appear without an author, no references and yet on "respected" university pages.

    http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/content/152/2/149.short - Vitamin supplement has no beneficial effect but may increase mortality

    http://annals.org/article.aspx?articleid=718049&issueno=1 - Meta analysis indicating vitamin E supplementation may increase mortality and should be avoided.

    Some vitamins are great to supplement but the scatter-gun approach of multi-vitamins is not the way to go. Just eat proper food in the first place and dont get conned into marketing.


    http://www.pnas.org/content/106/21/8665.short " Consistent with the concept of mitohormesis, exercise-induced oxidative stress ameliorates insulin resistance and causes an adaptive response promoting endogenous antioxidant defense capacity. Supplementation with antioxidants may preclude these health-promoting effects of exercise in humans."

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