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Vitamin E may do more harm than good

CTV.ca News Staff

 

People who take vitamin E supplements in the hope that it will help them live

longer may be doing themselves more harm than good, a new study has found. But

at least one Canadian nutritional expert has reservations with the study.

 

Dr. Edgar Miller of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, conducted the study

and found that people taking high doses of vitamin E may be more likely to die

earlier.

 

" I think people take vitamin E because they think it is going to make you live

longer, but this (study) doesn't support that, " Miller told reporters Wednesday,

admitting he was surprised by his team's findings.

 

Miller and his colleagues didn't conduct a new study on the vitamin, also called

alpha-tocopherol. They simply re-analyzed 19 studies conducted between 1993 and

2004.

 

The trials involved more than 136,000 mostly elderly patients in North America,

Europe and China. The dosages of vitamin E ranged from 16.5 to 2000 IU per day,

with the median around 400 IU.

 

His team found that people who took 200 IU (international units) of vitamin E a

day or more for a year died at a higher rate during the study than people who

did not take supplements.

 

" It's about a five per cent increased risk at 45 years in the trials pooled

together, " Miller told a meeting of the American Heart Association.

 

" That doesn't sound like a lot, but if you apply it to 25 per cent of the (U.S.)

adult population taking vitamin E, that is significant. "

 

The trials involved older adults with chronic diseases and the authors don't

know if the findings would apply to younger, healthy adults.

 

People often take vitamin E for its antioxidant properties, hoping it will help

counter oxidation by unstable " free radical " molecules, which damage cells and

can accelerate aging and lead to heart disease and cancer.

 

According to the analysis, there is no increased risk of death with a dose of

200 IU per day or less; there may even be some benefit. But in higher doses,

the vitamin may actually promote oxidative damage and may overwhelm the body's

natural antioxidants, Miller says.

 

Natural vs. synthetic source

 

The average U.S. diet supplies 6 to 10 IU of E, from such things as nuts, oils,

whole grains and green leafy vegetables. Multivitamins usually contain about 30

IU.

 

About two-thirds of people who take vitamin E supplements take 400 IU or more,

Miller says.

 

" We don't think that people need to take vitamin E supplements, that they get

enough from the diet, " he said.

 

Health Canada guidelines suggest 1,000 mg, or approximately 660 IUs, of Vitamin

E as a daily upper limit for healthy adults between 19 and 70 years of age.

 

But Aileen Burford-Mason, an immunologist and nutritional consultant in Toronto,

sees problems with the study.

 

" I am not particularly concerned about the study because I think basically, it

is bad science, " she told CTV News.

 

She says the study's main fault is that it doesn't distinguish between natural

source vitamin E and synthetic source.

 

" Vitamin E is not a drug; there are different forms, and the different forms

really are of greater significance. There are difference between synthetic

vitamin E and natural vitamin E, which contains eight different chemically

related forms of vitamin e that we get naturally in food, " she says.

 

" Some of those other forms that are not present in the synthetic form may well

be more important in preventing heart disease and cancer. "

 

She says most health food stores sell natural source vitamin E, though synthetic

forms are available. She believes the study used the synthetic form, which may

account for their results.

 

Read more about Burford-Mason's comments on the study.

 

Carol