Multi-vitamins - do we need them and are they created equal?

Do you really need to take a multi-vitamins? Do you know why you should take vitamins? Do you know which vitamins you should take? Is a multi vitamin enough? Let me ask you this question how much manganese did you take in yesterday? You say, what is manganese? Even though we may think we eat fairly well we don’t necessarily know if we are covering all of our nutrient needs on a daily bases. In an ideal world, it would be best to get all our nutrition from high quality wholesome food, but how realistic is that? With our busy lifestyle we often don’t take the time to balance all of our meals. If you want to “cover your bases” take a broad-spectrum nutritional supplement, it will be your insurance that you are getting the right nutrient and it will help you protect yourself. Each vitamin plays an important role in maintaining your body normal functions, repairing cellular and tissue damages and maintaining your optimal wellness.

Things have changed! - (no kidding!) 20 years ago authorities were saying that if one had a healthy diet they did not need vitamins. 20 years later they have changed their tune due to the fact that research is showing that more then 80% of the American population is not eating their daily recommendations of fruits and vegetables – the Canadian food guide recommend 10.

In North America the 3 top killers are: heart disease, cancer, and stroke. Studies have shown that even a single daily serving of leafy green vegetable is sufficient to reduce the risk of heart disease by 11%. When it comes to cancer – a new Yale’s study is showing that approx. 25% can be blamed on genes. The other 75% is lifestyle: poor dietary habits, smoking, alcohol consumption, lack of exercise, and exposure to environmental toxins. Researcher from the University of California at Berkeley found strong evidence that fruits and vegetable in the diet provide a huge protective effect against cancer. As for stroke – studies have also shown a direct correlation between a higher intake of fruits and vegetable and decrease risk of stroke.

An other important point to consider is that our soils do not have the same contains and do not give our food the same nutritional values that it did let’s say 60 years ago. Nitrogen, Phosphorus and potassium fertilizer have had big role in the depletion of our soils. If the nutrients are not in the soil, there are not in our food and they are not in bodies. We should never disregard the importance of a balance diet but it is not enough anymore. The food my grand parents were eating from their farm 60 years ago was very different them what we are eating right now.

Vitamins are not all created equal!

Not all vitamins are created equal, quality is key! Most vitamins found in drug stores, even recognized brands, have very low absorption rate (Comparative guide to nutritional supplements by Lyle Mac William 3rd and 4th edition). We are looking a 3 to 10% only. Vitamins that you get through a natural health provider can actually give you close to 100% absorption. So the question is would you pay $10 for vitamins of which you only retain 3 to 10 % of the benefits when you can retain 100% of the benefits by paying a bit more?

In the Comparative guide to nutritional supplements over 1500 supplements available in the United States and Canada were tested. Each supplement were evaluated with a Health Support Profile based on 18 criterias: Completeness, Potency, Mineral forms, Bioactivity of Vitamin E, GammaTocopherol, Antioxydant support, Bone Health , Heart Health, Liver Health, Metabolic Health , Ocular Health , Methylation Support, Lipotrophic Factors, Inflammation Control, Glycation Control, Bioflavonoid Profile, Phenolic Compound Profile and Potential Toxicities.
Each product then achieve a score based on a star system (no star to five stars) – five stars being the best. When I show the book to my patients they are shocked to see that the multi-vitamin they have been taking for year as score .5 stars out of 5!



How is your multi-vitamin rating?



Taking a poor supplement is worst then taking no supplements. Not only do you get a sense of false security that you are getting the adequate supplementation but you can also be ingesting toxic substance! More on that later.... We will cover vitamin expedients - binders and the one a day concept!