DailyDirt: Take Your Vitamins... Or Not. Who Knows What's Good For You?

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

It's not always simple to know what's good for your health. We've seen that the placebo effect is far more complicated than it seems (or is usually presented) as its effects have grown stronger and stronger over the years across many clinical trials. Doctors themselves aren't always certain what's the "best" health advice, and they're constantly re-evaluating whether current recommendations are actually valid -- to develop better recommendations. Here are just a few links on vitamins and some of their (mistaken) benefits. If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.
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Filed Under: antioxidants, dietary supplements, health, iron, placebo effect, popeye, spinach, vitamins


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  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 1 Nov 2013 @ 5:57pm

    Some megadoses of vitamins are okay

    Apparently, you can't really overdose on vitamin C.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Paraquat (profile), 1 Nov 2013 @ 6:36pm

    Vitamins D3, B12

    In recent years, it's being found that Vitamin D is more important than previously realized. UV light shining on the skin produces large amounts of vitamin D and theoretically nobody needs to take supplements. However, many people don't get enough due to the fact that they spend too much time indoors. Plus it's also true that excessive exposure of your skin to sunlight leads to early skin aging and skin cancer, so you shouldn't spend your time in a tanning bed.

    Thus, taking vitamin D3 (as opposed to D2, which isn't as beneficial) makes a lot of sense, especially during winter when you are much less likely to be exposed to sunlight. In fact, many medical researchers have concluded that the flu epidemics in winter are the result of less vitamin D being produced in the body at that time of year. Vitamin D apparently plays a big role in helping the immune system.

    Just how much vitamin D3 should one take in winter? It used to be that the minimum daily requirement was established at 400 IU, but that is just barely enough to prevent rickets, a dangerous disease caused by vitamin D deficiency. These days, 2000 IU should be considered minimum, or about 5000 IU at the high end. On a sunny day, sunbathing will get you around 20,000 IU per hour (though it may also get you a bad sunburn).

    About vitamin B12 - no need to take supplements if you eat meat or fish. But the recent trend to go vegan poses a serious risk of deficiency. There are no plant foods that provide sufficient quantities of B12. If you're vegan, you'd be well advised to take B12 supplements. A B12 deficiency is serious - it can lead to brain damage.

    As it so happens, I'm a person who has to take B12 injections (I do it twice monthly, administering the shots myself). In my case it has nothing to do with diet, but it's because I've had intestinal surgery with the part of the intestine that absorbs B12 removed. Before I started doing the injections, I was developing all the classic symptoms of B12 deficiency - fatigue, depression, nervous system issues. Fortunately, caught it on time to avoid any irreversible damage. But I'm now acutely aware of just how important B12 is, and I tell my vegan friends (though none of them want to listen - they may live to regret it).

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 2 Nov 2013 @ 12:46am

    The first guy that start selling kits for people to test themselves and see what things do in their bodies will get rich.

    Just saying

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anin, 2 Nov 2013 @ 3:12pm

    Maybe

    for 20 years I used to get splitting headaches regularly, every month or two. (Maybe it was migraine, I never really asked a doctor I just assumed it was normal.) At one point I started taking a daily multivitamin, originally Centrum, currently the generic Costco ones. Since then, I have never had those headaches, I can't remember when I last had one.

    It's not placebo effect, it's something I realized maybe a year or two after I started, that the headaches had disappeared. My theory - if you are deficit on something the vitamins will help. If you have enough of a vitamin or mineral, odds are extra does little for you. However, with the lesser variety in modern processed food, it probably can't hurt to have a small dose of everything to ensure you are topped up.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Donald Delgor, 2 Nov 2013 @ 4:38pm

    A misguided sound bite

    This sound bite's headline is misleading at best. It suggests you'd get a balanced account of both the opponents and advocates of vitamin supplements. But in the text body you find almost nothing else but references that supplements are not needed and basically unnecessary or useless. For a more profound examination of the anti-vitamin claims and "evidence" read "2 Big Lies: No Vitamin Benefits & Supplements Are Very Dangerous" by Rolf Hefti. This piece here is mere empty rhetoric.....

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous, 2 Nov 2013 @ 7:25pm

    Word is that Popeye has a serious case of kidney stones.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 3 Nov 2013 @ 9:38pm

    Not only vitamins, minerals can be deadly too.

    See information for iron poisoning warning text at FDA for iron containing daily supplements for example.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    howard bailey, 4 Mar 2014 @ 6:52am

    Infact excess of anything can be harmful !

    Well excess of anything can be harmful. People using vitamins must know all the aspects of the dosage they are on to. For instance Vitamin b12 has lot of benefits for skin, for memory loss problems and number of other ones but at the same time it got side effects.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Proviron, 8 May 2014 @ 1:53am

    vitamins

    well it was interesting and a lot of deviation between in between I believe and what you are saying. you are saying spinach has not any extraordinary amount of iron which is hard to believe but you have reasons. I agree with your opinion of getting rid of vitamin D and just go outside for natural vitamin D.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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