Are You Taking Multi-Vitamins? Do you have a death wish or something??!! If you happen to have bought into recent "studies" on this subject matter, then maybe you do.
I, however, don't think taking multi-vitamins will kill you. I think reading "studies" that are full of questionable data might though.
Allow me to explain myself...
According to a report in the October 10th issue of
Archives of Internal Medicine, consuming dietary supplements, including multivitamins, folic acid, iron and copper, among others, appears to be associated with an increased risk of death in older women.
The conclusion was that use of common multi-vitamins (including Calcium, Iron and Copper ... which are
actually minerals, in case you're wondering) have an increased risk for causing death to those to take them. Conversely, Calcium was associated with decreased mortality (death).
There was a lot of press about this study (probably because it freaked millions of older women out!) and even made the home page of Yahoo! at the time.
But the one little thing this study failed to mention, was what sort of stuff they didn't account for during this study to ascertain these SHOCKING results.
You see, there are studies and there are
"studies." The "study" cited in the article was named the "Iowa Woman's Health Study." It's what's called a "Retrospective Study of Already Collected Data."
Sounds impressive, right?
Not really. Basically, surveys were sent to 38,772 postmenopausal women (average age at start of study was 61.2 years) in 1986, 1997 and 2004.
Then, Iowa death records were checked for accuracy about mortality rates, and roughly forty percent of those women had died during those eighteen years.
The data collected in the "study" included the following: diet, supplement usage [those are vitamins, ya'll], weight, smoking history, hormone replacement therapy history and history of heart or diabetes.
Oddly, some chronic and/or degenerative diseases weren't on the list. Hmm, not wanting to know
whether any of these ladies have CANCER seems a little fishy, no? This seems like a pretty big omission doesn't it?
There are two aspects to this omission that I feel are significant to mention:
- Cancer, like heart disease and diabetes (included in the surveys), is a chronic/degenerative disorder. So why wasn't it included? It just doesn't make sense.
- Also, no questions were asked as to WHY these women were taking supplements. It would be safe to assume that there were some women who started taking supplements after a diagnosis of cancer (or indeed, any other scary diagnosis).
Trust me, as a chiropractor who's been offering nutritional advice
for close to 20 years, this is extremely common. I'll even go out on a limb here and say that the majority of people who use supplements, do so out of trying to fend off a syndrome or disease after they've been diagnosed, arguably late in the game.
But that's what I've seen. So, that's gnawing away at me, why didn't they record data about Cancer and why these women were taking supplements?
Some of the conclusions back up previous studies, such as supplementing with iron and copper - if unneeded by the patient -
can have toxic effects due to the generation of free radicals (that's why anti-oxidants are often recommended).
Also, significant benefit was found with the following supplements:
B, C, D, E and Calcium. But the way the data on this "study" was merged with the rest was... well... perhaps a little
flawed. (More detail on this can be found at the "
Life Extension Foundation" website).
This here is just my opinion.
But wait, there's more. Want to know my real beef? Or tofu, for the vegetarians out there? The term "
Retrospective"
So, a survey is sent out 3x over 18 years, and that's supposed to be trusted to be
accurate information? As a clinician who hands out questionnaires, like a ceiling fan's blades whip through the air, I know how flawed this is. Most people's memory regarding their health is typically fuzzy because hey, they have lives to lead and don't really want to think about their health. It takes a geek like me to want to do this type of work!
As an example, I myself can't remember what supplements I was taking 3 months ago, although I should mention I'm continuously tweaking the recipe!
I look at this "study" as a snapshot, as just some marginally useful information, but certainly not ammunition for the "Vitamins Will Kill You Crowd."
Thanks also to
Alliance for Natural Health USA for information and perspective on this. Sometimes it helps to get a second opinion when reading these types of articles.
I'd be interested in hearing your comments and thoughts on this matter. Do you take multi-vitamins and other nutritional supplements? And why?
Yours in health,
Dr. Jeanne
W:
http://northwestminneapolischiropractor.com
P: 612.259.7323
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