Can I get a consensus on what our members think of taking vitamins-any vitamin supplement…
I had been taking B-12 to help my brain. It seems to work but ya know power of suggestion :eek:
My doctor said I dont need any supplements and not to take any, but I have a slight anemia and she wants me to take iron. I eat food all day long with iron. I dont see where I should be anemic.
She also said that my levels have been stable over the past few years so I should be ok…um. :smack::smack:
I’ve also heard that taking vitamins only supply enriched pee.
The logic I follow with this question, is basic and mechanical. Vitamins, the actual substance, not the tablets said to contain it, have been confirmed to be necessary for best function of the human body. It has also been established scientifically that different human bodies do better than others at making the vitamins needed from what we eat.
Therefore some people will benefit from vitamins, and another will not. Also, each person who might benefit from one, might not benefit from what the person next to them could do.
The variation in needs and results, convinces some people that taking supplements is an act of foolishness, since they expect EVERYONE to benefit exactly the same way. However, some who recognize the complexities of the human body mechanisms and their subtleties, discover that SOME vitamins do seem to help them.
Hence I recommend careful experimentation with small doses. As long as you don’t go overboard, it will at least be harmless, and if it helps even psychologically, then it’s a boon.
They have been proven to be a waste of money, and in fact can indeed cause more harm than good.
I have heard this from multiple trusted sources over many years.
Now, certainly if you have anemia an iron supplement is the way to go, but otherwise, unless specifically diagnosed with a medical deficiency, do not take supplements.
You are literally pissing away money, and again, it may actually be harmful.
The wife and I take a multivitamin each day. We figure what the hell. But as we age, our energy level is dropping, so if the multivitamin really is helping, then I’d hate to think how we’d feel if we weren’t taking it.
I have gotten medically verified benefits from B-12, magnesium citrate and D3 supplements. I have even been prescribed an over the counter multi-vitamin at times.
I think that a blanket statement that “you are just pissing away money” is too sweeping to be of any use to an individual person. Most people are magnesium deficient for example (it is hard to detect through standard blood tests) and I know for a fact that remediating that can fix some rather serious problems like muscle spasms, restless leg syndrome, general stress and maybe even prevent a sudden heart event.
There is also a reason why I am descended from people that are so white we wilt quickly in the sun. Our bodies are trying to generate all of the vitamin D that it can and failing badly at it. Supplements can easily fix that. During my last physical, my doctor noted that I wasn’t vitamin D deficient for the first time since he met me. No shit Sherlock, I figured out the problem on my own and fixed it with a few dollars worth of tiny pills. My ancestors had to go through evolutionary hell because of it but all I needed to do was find a sale at the local CVS.
Money shouldn’t be an issue unless you are working as an unpaid intern for a homeless person. A year’s supply of generic supplements costs less than $20 total if you get them on sale. There is almost nothing someone could tell me personally that would convince me to stop taking them unless they showed me it caused a weird tumor growing out from my navel or something. I like to think the brightly colored pee is just a side benefit like a little personal fireworks display every morning.
Longstanding argument in our household. Mrs. B. (the STBX) has always adamantly maintained that vitamins are a waste of money… because her mother said so, some number of decades ago. (Odd in that she’s a bit of a food/nutrition trooper.)
I take generic multivitamins, which at 2 cents a day aren’t costing anything worth noting and, as several have already noted, are very much in the “can’t hurt/might help” category of things. (I also take a medically-recommended D3 supplement, being overweight, over50 and living in the northern climes. That one does seem to help my mood and energy levels, over time.)
Taking weird and unproven supplements or megadoses is one thing, but an RDA+ multivite? At around $10 a year cost? No brainer.
I thought that part of the reason why there is a epidemic of low Vitamin-D in our country was that pill supplements weren’t very effective at raising levels?
My received understanding is that the RDA in daily multis is far too low to boost D levels in the body, but are meant to supplement other sources (dairy, sunlight, etc.) Those of us who are low (temporarily or chronically) need much larger doses, 3-6,000 units daily.
[ol]
[li]Regular multivitamins (within RDA) probably don’t do much.[/li][li]High-dosage vitamins don’t do anything either, and probably have negative consequences.[/li][li]Most non-vitamin supplements don’t do much, and have various, sometime high risks of negative consequences.[/li][/ol]
So I still don’t see any good argument against taking a daily, RDA multivite. Doesn’t cost much, is composed entirely of substances the body can use (but may already get from other dietary sources) and may be pure voodoo as far as long-term health goes.
Falls into the “may as well” category for me, especially at 2 cents a day.
It isn’t really Pascal’s Wager because some supplements do work. Magnesium deficiencies are common if not the norm and have very noticeable effects (it can be fatal in extreme cases). It is an artifact of modern agricultural practices. Vitamin D deficiencies are also very real and contribute to everything from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) to bone loss. Vitamin B12 deficiencies are common in alcoholics and can cause permanent brain damage if they aren’t remediated. One of the first things the nurses do when they admit someone to rehab is give them a giant shot of B vitamins so that they can start to heal physically.
I am not recommending any specific supplement to any specific person. It is just bullshit to say that many of them aren’t bio-active and they do have their place. If you knew the deficiency in advance, common, over the counter supplements would probably work just fine to alleviate the damage.
It sounds to me like researchers are basing their models based on someone with a near ideal lifestyle and diet. We all know that isn’t the case for everyone.
Yes, I think you’re mostly right. In all the research I’ve read, they talk about over the counter vitamin supplements that are self prescribed. If you have a known deficiency and are prescribed a specific supplement, you’re, probably, good to go.
I believe most vitamin deficiencies have specific causes. It doesn’t take an ideal lifestyle to not have a a deficiency.
ISTM that most take vitamins prophylactically and in that case you are, at best, wasting your money, and at worst, doing harm
I’ve linked to this website elsewhere. You can filter it to just show vitamin supplements and the current thinking/research on what they are good for. If you mouse over, it will show you the supposedly affected disease. If you click on a bubble, you’ll find notes and a link to current research.
I work with a number of pharmacists and vitamins are universally reviled as a waste of money and thought to do more harm than good. That is, self-prescribed vitamins. Supplements do have their place; when your doctor says so.
The problem is a huge industry has been built-up on spurious claims of health benefits while the products are not required to be subjected to any rigorous FDA tests. They are also manufactured with inconsistent doses and may only contain a tiny amount of said product you think you are buying. Vitamins are the modern-day snake-oil.
Unless your health-care provider tells you that you need more than 100 percent of the recommended daily intake of a particular nutrient, you probably don’t. “It doesn’t make sense to me to take huge doses of vitamins and minerals unless there’s a diagnosed problem, because there is so little evidence that they do good and sometimes a possibility that they might do harm,” says Marion Nestle, M.P.H., Ph.D., a professor of nutrition, food studies, and public health at New York University.
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Multivitamins. Large clinical trials have repeatedly found that multivitamins don’t improve the health of the average person. People who might need a multivitamin include women who are pregnant, breast-feeding, or trying to conceive; dieters consuming fewer than 1,200 calories a day or cutting out an entire food group (carbs, for example); and those with medical conditions that affect digestion and food absorption.
What mikecurtis, snowthx and others have said here. 99+% of them are not only a waste of time and money, but are more likely to harm than they are to help.
And the analogy comparing vitamins and supplements to fire extinguishers fails on many levels.