A few years ago, I learned that multivitamins are ineffective, according to research. At that point, I have heard of the benefits of many of them, they were individually praised like some would praise anything that’s good enough to take by itself, so I was thinking that multivitamins should be something ultra-effective that only irrational people won’t take. When I learned they were ineffective, I hypothesized that vitamins in pills simply don’t get processed well.
Recently, I was reading a fewarticles about Vitamin D—I thought I should definitely have it, because the sources were rather scientific and were praising it a lot. I got it in the form of softgels, because gwern suggested it. When they arrived, I saw it’s very similar to pills, so I thought it might be ineffective and decided to take another look at Wikipedia/Multivitamins. Then I got very confused.
Apparently, the multivitamins DO get processed! And yes, they ARE found to have no significant effect (even in double-blind placebo trials), But at the same time, we have pages saying that 50-60% of the people are deprived from Vitamin D and that it seriously reduces the risk of cancer, among with other things (including a heart disease). Can anyone explain what’s going on?
I don’t really follow. A multivitamin != vitamin D, so it’s no surprise that they might do different things. If a multivitamin had no vitamin D in it, or if it had vitamin D in different doses, or if it had substances which interacted with vitamin D (such as calcium), or if it had substances which had negative effects which outweigh the positive (such as vitamin A?), we could well expect differing results.
In this case, all of those are true to varying extents. Some multivitamins I’ve had contained no vitamin D. The last multivitamin I was taking both contains vitamins used in the negative trials and also some calcium; the listed vitamin D dosage was ~400IU, while I take >10x as much now (5000IU).
That would only makes sense if vitamin D is the only one that has any real significant effects or if the other ones who do, are too included in small dosages (this doesn’t seem improbable at all).
I remember seeing studies which doubt that vitamin C would help healing from common cold. No wonder if most other are as insignificant.
Also, just checked some pills of vitamins (for hair, skin and nails) I bought 1-2 years ago. It says “take 3 times a day” and it has 100 IU of vitamin D. It’s also apparently 50% of RDA—most other vitamins/minerals in it are up to 200-250%, and my vitamin D pills are 1250% RDA. Mystery solved, I guess.
Supplements have quality issues often. You’d be surprised what they get away with. Sometimes the coating doesn’t digest, so the nutrients aren’t absorbed. Sometimes they use the wrong form of the substance because it is cheaper. Sometimes they’re even contaminated with lead. I only buy vitamins that have been tested by an independent lab. So far, the best brands I’ve found were Solgar and Jarrow.
I am very confused right now.
A few years ago, I learned that multivitamins are ineffective, according to research. At that point, I have heard of the benefits of many of them, they were individually praised like some would praise anything that’s good enough to take by itself, so I was thinking that multivitamins should be something ultra-effective that only irrational people won’t take. When I learned they were ineffective, I hypothesized that vitamins in pills simply don’t get processed well.
Recently, I was reading a few articles about Vitamin D—I thought I should definitely have it, because the sources were rather scientific and were praising it a lot. I got it in the form of softgels, because gwern suggested it. When they arrived, I saw it’s very similar to pills, so I thought it might be ineffective and decided to take another look at Wikipedia/Multivitamins. Then I got very confused.
Apparently, the multivitamins DO get processed! And yes, they ARE found to have no significant effect (even in double-blind placebo trials), But at the same time, we have pages saying that 50-60% of the people are deprived from Vitamin D and that it seriously reduces the risk of cancer, among with other things (including a heart disease). Can anyone explain what’s going on?
I don’t really follow. A multivitamin != vitamin D, so it’s no surprise that they might do different things. If a multivitamin had no vitamin D in it, or if it had vitamin D in different doses, or if it had substances which interacted with vitamin D (such as calcium), or if it had substances which had negative effects which outweigh the positive (such as vitamin A?), we could well expect differing results.
In this case, all of those are true to varying extents. Some multivitamins I’ve had contained no vitamin D. The last multivitamin I was taking both contains vitamins used in the negative trials and also some calcium; the listed vitamin D dosage was ~400IU, while I take >10x as much now (5000IU).
Is that unsatisfactory?
That would only makes sense if vitamin D is the only one that has any real significant effects or if the other ones who do, are too included in small dosages (this doesn’t seem improbable at all).
I remember seeing studies which doubt that vitamin C would help healing from common cold. No wonder if most other are as insignificant.
Also, just checked some pills of vitamins (for hair, skin and nails) I bought 1-2 years ago. It says “take 3 times a day” and it has 100 IU of vitamin D. It’s also apparently 50% of RDA—most other vitamins/minerals in it are up to 200-250%, and my vitamin D pills are 1250% RDA. Mystery solved, I guess.
Supplements have quality issues often. You’d be surprised what they get away with. Sometimes the coating doesn’t digest, so the nutrients aren’t absorbed. Sometimes they use the wrong form of the substance because it is cheaper. Sometimes they’re even contaminated with lead. I only buy vitamins that have been tested by an independent lab. So far, the best brands I’ve found were Solgar and Jarrow.
(Links are created by writing [ text ] then ( url ), you seem to have used parentheses for both.)