Can I ingest over 1000 mgs. of niacin w/o bad effects?

[handsomeharry]

I just started taking niacin. I, years ago, took some and it gave me a cool skin flush.
OK, so, recently, I read some nutritional report and it seemed that niacin would be a good thing to add to my diet.
I bought a bottle of 500 mg. niacin tabs. When I got it home, I found out that it was ‘non-flushable’, meaning, I wouldn’t get my little skin buzz, and, also, it said not to take more than 1 a day.

So, today, I took all of my vitamins, etc…with my niacin tablet. Maybe. I can’t really remember. I shouldn’t care to drop dead, so, if I take one, and it turns out that it was my second one for the day, am I a goner?

Thanks,
hh

[Joey_P]

Just googling “Niacine dosage” comes back with tons of hits that recommend dosages anywhere from a few mgs a day to well over a few grams. Dosages over the 1gram (1000mg) mark seem to be for certain health issues and I have no idea what happens if you take them regularly AND you don’t have that problem (like high LDL). You might want to poke around on the internet and see what you come up with.
I probably wouldn’t do it without a doctor recommending it, but you probably aren’t going to die from doing it once.

My doc has be on 4X the RDA of B2 (Riboflavin). It makes my pee BRIGHT yellow. It looks like a drank a highlighter.

[ruadh]

When I was a teenager a friend of mine suggested we take loads of niacin for what you term the “cool skin flush”. I don’t remember how much we took but it was the worst most uncomfortable high ever.

[bob_2]

The whole business of taking vitamin supplements is a scam.

The vitamin and supplements industry, which is immensely profitable, relies on the intuition that if a little bit of something is good for you, a bit more can’t hurt. Right?

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~~

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“People almost never get too much vitamin B6 from food. But taking high levels of vitamin B6 from supplements for a year or longer can cause severe nerve damage, leading people to lose control of their bodily movements.”

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[/QUOTE]

How much niacin do I need?

The amount of niacin you need is about:
17mg a day for men
13mg a day for women
You should be able to get all the niacin you need from your daily diet.
Niacin cannot be stored in the body, so you need it in your diet every day.

What happens if I take too much niacin?
Taking high doses of nicotinic acid supplements can cause skin flushes. Taking high doses for a long time could lead to liver damage.
There is not enough evidence to know what the effects might be of taking high daily doses of nicotinamide supplements.

Vitamins and minerals - B vitamins and folic acid - NHS

[JerrySTL]

I was on a prescription dosage of 1000 mg of niacin a few years ago to help control cholesterol levels. I would flush badly and usually took ten 100 mg pills individually throughout the day. I looked into the slow release pills, but read that they are actually more harmful to the kidneys or liver, if I remember correctly, than taking the normal pills.

[Qadgop_the_Mercotan]

High dose niacin can get a person into trouble. It’s prescribed in higher doses (but in delayed release formulations) to treat some forms of hyperlipidemia, but is much less used these days due to potential side-effects and less than stellar efficacy.

Concerns related to adverse effects from uptodate.com:

• Flushing/pruritus: Flushing and pruritus, common adverse effects of niacin, may be attenuated with a gradual increase in dose, administering with food, avoidance of concurrent ingestion of ethanol or hot liquids, and/or by taking aspirin (adults: 325 mg) 30 minutes before dosing (Stone, 2013). May also use other NSAIDs according to the manufacturer. Flushing associated with extended release preparation is significantly reduced (Guyton, 2007). For immediate release preparations, may administer in 2 to 3 divided doses to reduce the frequency and severity. Niacin should not be used if patient experiences persistent severe cutaneous symptoms during therapy (Stone, 2013).

• Gastrointestinal effects: May cause gastrointestinal distress, vomiting, diarrhea, or aggravate peptic ulcer; gastrointestinal distress may be attenuated with a gradual increase in dose and administration with food. Use is contraindicated in patients with active peptic ulcer disease; use with caution in patients with a past history of peptic ulcer. Niacin should not be used if patient experiences unexplained abdominal pain or gastrointestinal symptoms or unexplained weight loss during therapy (Stone, 2013).

• Hematologic effects: Dose-related reductions in platelet count and increases of prothrombin time may occur.

• Hepatotoxicity: Cases of severe hepatotoxicity, including fulminant hepatic necrosis, have occurred when immediate release (crystalline) niacin products have been substituted with sustained-release (modified release, timed-release) niacin products at equivalent doses. Patients should be initiated with low doses (eg, niacin extended-release 500 mg at bedtime) with titration to achieve desired response. Liver function tests should be monitored in all patients receiving lipid-lowering doses of niacin. Niacin should not be used if hepatic transaminase elevations >2 to 3 times upper limit of normal occur during therapy (Stone, 2013).

• Hypophosphatemia: Has been associated with small but statistically significant dose-related reductions in phosphorus levels. Monitor phosphorus levels periodically in patients at risk for hypophosphatemia.
My advice? Don’t do it. Niacin deficiency in this day and age is almost unheard of.

[handsomeharry]

Thanks, all.

Will dump my niacin pronto.

[SpyOne]

@Qadgop_the_Mercotan

Concerns related to adverse effects from uptodate.com:

That site requires a membership to view articles.

What kind of dosages are those adverse effects caused at? Most of the stuff I found 9at webmd and drugs.com) suggests the bad adverse effects (not just flushing skin) is only caused by taking several grams every day for a prolonged period.

So my opinion, and to be clear I am not only not a medical expert of any kind bt also some random stranger on the internet, but my opinion is that if you are taking 500mg of niacin every day, accidentally doubling that one day probably won’t hurt.

That said, 500mg is something like 28 times the US RDA for niacin, and I wouldn’t take that much every day unless I had talked to a doctor about it.

[barbitu8]

500 mg. is harmless. You should have a prescription if you take more. A few years ago my tp recommended 500 mg. a day to lower my LDL, which was not very high to begin with, but he wanted it well under 100. After doing so for a year, my next physical showed a remarkable drop in my LDL and my HDL was over 90. If my doctor recommended 500 mg. w/o Rx, I would assume that amount is safe.

[Surreal]

@barbitu8

500 mg. is harmless. You should have a prescription if you take more. A few years ago my tp recommended 500 mg. a day to lower my LDL, which was not very high to begin with, but he wanted it well under 100. After doing so for a year, my next physical showed a remarkable drop in my LDL and my HDL was over 90. If my doctor recommended 500 mg. w/o Rx, I would assume that amount is safe.

Although niacin lowers LDL and triglycerides while raising HDL, it does not appear to reduce actual cardiovascular disease risk:

http://examine.com/supplements/Vitamin+B3

Niacin supplementation is very effective at normalizing blood lipid levels. People with low HDL-C levels supplementation experience an increase in HDL-C levels, while people with high LDL-C experience a reduction in LDL-C levels. Triglyceride levels also fall after supplementation, which makes niacin look like a great cardioprotective supplement on paper. Unfortunately, niacin supplementation does not result in reduced cardiovascular disease risk, since it also increases insulin resistance, which negates the benefits niacin provides for blood lipid levels.