Dietary supplements....Are they really neccessary | Arthritis Information
While vitamin B12, calcium, and vitamin D are really the only dietary supplements you may need to stay healthy as you get older, many people are still tempted to try other supplements. In this Special Report Johns Hopkins helps you see beyond the hype and understand the risks and benefits of the dietary supplements you take.
Stop! Before you take a dietary supplement, it's important to consider whether you really need it. Sure, supplements sound like a good idea, but the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) doesn't regulate them for safety and effectiveness -- meaning their marketing doesn't have to be supported by good scientific data -- and manufacturers often make outlandish claims about their benefits.
Supplements may contain all sorts of substances -- from herbs and botanicals to amino acids, enzymes, and animal extracts -- that don't have enough evidence to support their supposed health-promoting properties. Some "natural" supplements have proven effective because potent drugs are added; others contain dangerous amounts of contaminants, such as heavy metals.
You should always discuss any supplements you're taking with your doctor or nutritionist since they may interact with your medications to cause a serious reaction. For instance, vitamin K can decrease the effectiveness of the blood thinner warfarin (Coumadin) and increase clotting. Calcium can also negatively interact with the heart medicine digoxin (Digitek, Lanoxin) as well as certain antibiotics and drugs. Supplements can also worsen a medical condition, pose a danger before or after you have surgery, or put you at risk for overdosing on certain vitamins and minerals. (For example, many supplements exceed safe levels of vitamin A.)
Beneficial Supplements for Seniors Experts advise that you meet your nutritional needs first and foremost by consuming a variety of healthy foods as set forth in the Dietary Guidelines for Americans (for information, visit www.health.gov/DietaryGuidelines). That said, certain vitamin and mineral supplements can help older people get the right amounts of nutrients -- but they are intended to supplement the diet, not to replace the foods you should be eating.
The following dietary supplements are recommended for seniors:
- Vitamin B12. Since many older adults don't absorb this vitamin efficiently from foods, guidelines advise either a supplement at a dose of 2.4 micrograms (mcg) a day or a combination of fortified foods and supplements that adds up to this amount. Foods with naturally occurring vitamin B12 don't count toward this goal. The Dietary Guidelines for Americans say that people over age 50 should be encouraged to consume vitamin B12–fortified products, such as breakfast cereals, or to take the crystalline form of vitamin B12 in supplements.
- Vitamin D. With aging, the body has a more difficult time absorbing vitamin D from foods or making it when exposed to sunlight. Yet adequate vitamin D is important in helping to prevent the bone loss that can occur with aging. The Dietary Guidelines recommend that older adults get 1,000 IU a day from vitamin D-fortified foods such as breakfast cereals, orange juice, and milk, plus fatty fishes like salmon, tuna, and mackerel -- and from dietary supplements if needed. Most supplements contain 400 IU of vitamin D, so taking one or two a day in addition to eating fortified foods should suffice.
- Calcium and vitamin D for postmenopausal women. An authoritative panel convened by the U.S. government reviewed data from well-designed trials of supplements and concluded that calcium and vitamin D increase bone density and decrease the risk of hip and other fractures in older men and women.
Experts recommend 1,200 mg of calcium a day for older adults and 1,000 IU of vitamin D. Calcium from dietary supplements is best absorbed in doses of 500 mg or less, so if you are taking more than that in supplements, take it in divided doses.
What To Ask Before Taking a Supplement
Review the following questions, recommended by the FDA, and share your answers with your doctor or nutritionist so together you can decide whether you should take a vitamin or mineral supplement:
- Do you eat fewer than two meals a day?
- Do you eat a restricted diet? For instance, do you not eat meat, milk, or milk products, or fewer than five servings of fruits and vegetables a day?
- Have you lost or gained more than 10 lbs in the past six months without trying to?
- Do you take three or more prescription or over-the-counter medications a day?
- Do you drink three or more alcoholic beverages a day?
Also consider:
- What are the intended benefits of the product?
- How, when, and for how long will you need to take it?
They forgot about Vitamin C and lysine:
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Withholding life-saving health information from millions of people. It is simply unacceptable that today so few know that the human body cannot produce vitamin C and lysine, two key molecules for connective tissue stability and disease prevention.
John Hopkins? Wow
This article or whatever it is has contradictory ideas. If not enough scientific studies have been done on supplements how can they categorically state you don't need them? Wouldn't they not know one way or another?
With so much that is unknown about the human body, and how every body is different, as well as so much unknown about supplements, I'm wondering how they can state with such confidence what is all you need and don't need?
If you are worried about high vitamin A content or heavy metals, phone the manufacturer. Most supplements have consumer information hotlines. That is how I can be confident the Omega 3 supplements I take do not contain vitamin A or mercury.
We all have to be wary about puffery of complimentary and alternative medicine like vitamin D and calcium. My opinion is if your supplements work for you, and your doctor knows you take them, and you use a brand you trust, keep going in that direction.GoGo - the "scientific experts/medical researchers" still haven't figured out how aspirin (the bark of specific tree) works. The article did not categorically state that people don't need supplements. It merely urges caution.
True, its only the headline that states the lack of necessity, as the article itself just leaves out key components, making it suspect.
I like this juxtaposition of words:
"In this Special Report Johns Hopkins helps you see beyond the hype and understand the risks and benefits of the dietary supplements you take.
Stop!"
Subtle.
Is it just me, or does this seem like a clumsy PR piece? I googled the
original article and it doesn't cite any references or credit an author. Is this a marketing article for vitamin D and calcium? What is it?
Just goes to show, anyone can post anything on the internet. Glad you're enjoying the article
[QUOTE=justsaynoemore]
True, its only the headline that states the lack of necessity, as the article itself just leaves out key components, making it suspect.
[/QUOTE]
Again, it doesn't state lack of necessity - it questions whether they are necessary. Questioning is a good thing.thanks, Lynn... do you have a link, please?
ETA.. oops... while I was vacuuming and writing my grocery list you girls jumped ahead and got the article..
babs102008-12-06 10:54:03Lynn - any ideas on why John Hopkins would leave out Vitamin C? I mean, somebody figured it out about scurvy hundreds of years ago.
Babs,
It's a Johns Hopkins Health Alert...It was sent to me via email and I'm sure you understand why I can't link to my own email
PR? for what gimpy? who can benefit from that article????
thanks Lynn! you know I will.
babs102008-12-06 10:56:11[QUOTE=justsaynoemore]Lynn - any ideas on why John Hopkins would leave out Vitamin C? I mean, somebody figured it out about scurvy hundreds of years ago. [/QUOTE]
the article also address proper eating.. if you eat properly.. you won't get scurvy
Babs - the pharmaceutical companies of course. I don't know if you are aware of the huge push of legislation to regulate vitamins (which I agree), but to make them available only by prescription is going too far in my opinion for the USA. You can buy a gun, but need a script for Vitamin D only made by Bristol-Myers? Thank goodness this lame duck session died. I suspect the AMA and Big Pharma is out of their minds since PE Obama won. GoGo seems to be continuing on her opinion that the medical lobby and pharmaceutical companies are not our friends. But then in Canada, T3s are over-the-counter, while in America you still have to pay for a doctor's visit first. And then the doctors' complain they are overloaded and overworked. She does come from a country vastly superior to the US in its health care policies. the reasoning behind a dr visit first is the HM=effing=O's and the insurance companies... not the pharmas......
T3? thyroid?
those that think they can regulate (yes) but issue per script???l these minerals and supplements that have been OTC forever are delusional............. ain't no way. JMHO of course
babs102008-12-06 11:27:05babs, I have to strenuously disagree with your take on "ain't no way". There have been huge tug-o-wars going on for years with Big Pharma trying to get rhe health supplenment industry shut down via parliamentary measures. With all due respect, you should do a bit of homework before telling people they're delusional.
I'm surprised you could miss it even if you wanted to, it's been in the news so much. In Canada our version is "Bill C-51"/I am going to have to find my site about the proposed legislation. And post about Wilkes vs. AMA.
Babs - that only works in countries that can feed their populace.
A grassroots effort that is keeping nutritional supplements on American natural health food stores shelves:
A commercial from the '90's:
"Mel Gibson expresses his concern on the growing danger of losing our rights as Americans to take vitamins as we see fit. This commercial segment was shown nation wide to draw attention to this matter."
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http://www.brightcove.tv/title.jsp?title=686998246&channel=34868007semi-OT, but here is a site of the AMA's Committee on Quackery, formed to rid America of Chiropractic. The Chiropractors filed an anti-trust suit and won. In 1987. ? Shouldn't the AG have done this antitrust suit on behalf of the People of the United States? They went after Microsoft (a luxury item) for anti-trust.
In 1971, H. Doyle Taylor, the Director of the AMA Department of Investigation, and Secretary of its Committee on Quackery (COQ), submitted a memo to the AMA Board of Trustees stating:
Since the AMA Board of Trustees decision, at its , meeting on November 2-3, 1963, to establish a Committee on Quackery, your Committee has considered its prime mission to be, first, the containment of chiropractic and, ultimately, the elimination of chiropractic.
The following is an excerpt form the COQ's first annual report to the Board of the AMA:
...The Involvement (and indoctrination) of the State Medical Society leadership, in our opinion, is vital to the success of the chiropractic program...We hope and believe that, with continued aggressive AMA activity, chiropractic can and will be contained at the national level and that steps are being taken to stop or eliminate the licenser of chiropractic at the state level.
In 1967 the COQ released its anti chiropractic campaign goals:
Basically, the Committee's short-range objectives for containing the cult of chiropractic and any additional recognition it might achieve revolves about four points:
1. Doing everything within our power to see that chiropractic coverage under title 18 of the Medicare Law is not obtained.
2. Doing everything within our power to see that the recognition or listing by the U.S. Office of Education of a chiropractic accrediting agency is not achieved.
3. To encourage contained separation of the two national chiropractic associations.
4. To encourage state medical societies to take the initiative in their state legislatures in regard to legislation that might affect the practice of chiropractic.
The AMA through its Committee on Quackery continued its war against chiropractic through such acts as, distributing propaganda to the nations teachers and guidance councilors, eliminating the inclusion of chiropractic from the U.S Department of Labor's, Health Careers Guidebook, and establishing specific educational guidelines for medical schools regarding the "hazards to individuals form the unscientific cult of chiropractic."
The AMA did not stop with these acts of propaganda against the chiropractic profession. They worked both publicly and politically to insure that chiropractic failed as a profession. But, even with all of this negative publicity against the profession, chiropractic continued to gain acceptance with the general public, because chiropractic got results.
In 1975 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the case of Goldfarb vs. The Virginia State Bar, that learned professions are not exempt form antitrust suites. In 1982 the Court ruled that the FTC can enforce antitrust laws against medical societies. These two suites paved the way in 1976 for five chiropractors to file an anti-trust suite against the AMA and several other heath care agencies and societies in Federal District Court (known as the Wilkes Case).
Similar suites were filed in New York and Pennsylvania in 1979. The pressure of these law suites forced the AMA even before these suites went to court to propose a modification of their Medical Code of Ethics which prohibited M.D.s from associating with chiropractors. But, it was not until 1980 that the Ethics Code was changed to reflect that each individual doctor may decide for themselves whether to accept a patient from or refer a patient to a chiropractor or other limited practitioner.
The law suites caused so much fear in the medical profession that Mike Wallace (of 60 minutes) was unable to find an M.D. to take the anti-chiropractic side for a 1979 documentary piece on chiropractic.
In 1980 the Wilkes suite went to court, were the AMA and other defendants were found not guilty of all charges. That decision was overturned and a new trial was ordered by the U.S. Court of Appeals in February 1983.
Judge Susan Getzendanner found the AMA and others guilty of an illegal conspiracy against the chiropractic profession in September of 1987, ordering a permeate injunction against the AMA and forcing them to print the courts findings in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Several other of the defendants settled out of court helping to pay for the chiropractors legal expenses and donating to a chiropractic non-profit home for disabled children, Kentuckiana Children's Center.
This decision was upheld in the U.S. Court of Appeals in 1990 and again by the U.S. Supreme Court that same year.
Even with success of the Wilkes Case and other anti-trust litigation, the AMA continues to this day to wage a campaign against chiropractic. Today the attacks take the form of over-stated concerns for the safety of chiropractic health care. The truth is that chiropractic has proven it self over the last 100 plus years, to be a safe and effective means of maintaining health and treating musculo-skeletal injuries.This site has the legal case:
If you think the AMA is about helping patients, this should scare the krap out of you, as this is just the tip of the iceberg of what the AMA is up to.
What? The US court of Appeals and the Supreme Court must be suffering from Denialsim! Fab info you guys!
OK, let's look at the John Hopkins info. This is one of my main problems with them - they are soooo old news. I don't think I've ever seen anything from them that was forward thinking or remotely challenging the 'status quo' - basically, if we've thunk it for years then it has to be right.
That Vitamin K stuff caught my eye - recent research is showning MORE vitamin K helps regulate the immune system - and clotting spikes can be avoided by increasing the K levels; not the standard 'leave K alone and regulate the coumidin from there.'
Notice the commentry about microflora here - and we know if AP is effecting the gut flora then the biologics have to be.
Oops - I posted before I was done -
Here we see the same marketing machine like we find with the D manufactures and this is what they say about K.
I can't find the K research on 'increasing leads to better clotting control' but I will look for it. I just wish I would have known about it when I was on coumidin/heparin for lung blood clots.
But that's the Great U for you.
Pip
For those of you interested in learning more about Vitamin D...
Here's a great in-depth investigative article on the recent Vitamin D hype in the media:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/viewpoint/vp_strauss/20080213.html
An exerpt:
While the cancer numbers were small — only 50 cases in total — the CCS decision meant there was lots of coverage of the research. I found upwards of 50 reports in magazines, newspapers, radio and television, but absolutely zero coverage of the criticism of the paper that appeared in the journal in recent months.
In one letter, three scientists in Texas pointed out a number of issues, not the least of which being an Iowa study which suggested that when breast cancer was looked at there was indeed a fall in cancer numbers for the first five years when a vitamin D supplement was taken. But this balanced out at 10 years and there actually seemed to be more breast cancers among women taking vitamin D after 15 years.
The article has a lot of good information about medical studies being presented on Vitamin D. I think it dovetails nicely with Lynn's post
a primer on medical studies. which discusses a similar situation that once happned with Vitamin K.
What about fish oils??? They were considered alternative and "out there". Now ....my rheumie is insistant that I take them.....my pediatrician wants my teenage son to take them and my girlfriend who went to mayo clinic was advised by mayo to take them twice a day!! We can not judge others paths...we can only make our own!!
I'm investigating B12
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