Why do some health professionals dismiss vitamin supplements and yet strongly endorse other tablet forms?
A good example would be: Some GP’s will dismiss Vitamin tablets by saying they give you next to zero benefit because it is not absorbed by the body, yet they will strongly endorse other tablet forms that give nutrients i.e folic acid for pregnant woman? Either nutrients are absorbed by the body or not? Please can I have a clear answer from a health Professional (or someone who REALLY knows) only please. Than You.
Er… it’s called "Money" – everybody is SOMEWHERE on the bandwagon – even GPs get a rake-off from the Pharmaceutical Reps !
Er… it’s called "Money" – everybody is SOMEWHERE on the bandwagon – even GPs get a rake-off from the Pharmaceutical Reps !
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Unfortunately, most of it seems to come down to lack of training. Most doctors aren’t educated in nutrition enough (often only needing just a couple nutrition classes throughout all their training, if even that) and there are some classes and professors in med school that actually teach that supplements don’t work and/or are bad for you. I know there are quite a few doctors that will tell their clients that they are just wasting money taking supplements (even a multivitamin, as you mention).
As you point out, there are a couple nutrients that have been proven to help and doctors can’t deny it (specifically prenatal vitamins and Folic Acid)… most all gynecologists will at least recommend Folic Acid if not a full prenatal multi. Yes, it’s a pretty big contradiction ("this vitamin will work, but all the rest don’t") and it just points out how poorly doctors are educated in nutrition. There have been many studies that show how well various supplements work (some even have similar impacts as some drugs, but without the harmful side effects), but there are medical/pharmaceutical groups that also run studies that are aimed at giving negative results (like a recent one that showed that Vitamin E didn’t cure terminal diseases that was twisted to make it look like the Vitamin E was killing the patients), which they often in turn point out to doctors (furthering the "bad training" that they are subject to).
I am one of millions who wish it wasn’t this way in America… but unfortunately, it is.
Some say it’s more of a conspiracy (that doctors are just out to make money with prescriptions or they don’t want people to get healthy, but they they want them coming back for more treatments… there are lots of theories), but I like to look more on the bright side of human nature. Saying that all doctors are trying to keep you sick or are just so greedy that they don’t care if you get healthy just doesn’t seem right. From the way that the doctors I’ve talked to have responded, it seems like they really believe it, which would stem back to lack of training or bad training.
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Personal research in my role as a Product Specialist and I’ve talked to many doctors
There is so much controversy about nutrition supplements that many doctors decide that they aren’t worth it, but an OB GYN who didn’t give folic acid during pregnancy would be going against all available research on the prevention of neural tube defects. But even if they do believe in supplements, there is so much difference between the form of the nutrients that it is difficult to make a decision. Many tablets are made in a way that makes them almost completely unavailable; in other words, very little gets absorbed by the body. Many vitamins that for years had been said to achieve some purpose or other are shown years later to be totally ineffective. That isn’t true of folic acid.
What it comes down to is that the best way to get nutrients is to eat healthy food, since that’s where our body evolved to get them from. Unfortunately, nowadays, a lot of the "healthy" foods have been bred to extinction, favoring instead color, shape, disease resistance instead of nutritional content. So you have to decide if you want to try to get it from somewhere else, what form you want to get it in, etc.
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Most people get sufficient vitamins from their food. Vitamin supplements can be useful for people who don’t – like folic acid in pregnancy – but generally if you take extra vitamins, you just pee them out again.
The Royal College of Physicians has historic reasons for dismissing any kind of alternative or complimentary medicine. It was only a short while ago that they treated everything with leeches, purges, blood-letting and cupping. Medicine and surgery were dismissed as superstition. It was only the great advances in pharmacology and surgery at the beginning of the 20th century that made them change the nature of their profession and become the main distribution channel for the patent medicine companies. The professional snobbery of British physicians is not found elsewhere in the world where physic and medicine are regarded as synonymous.
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As a professional nutritionist I had this very question for a long time. And then the answer came:
SYNTHETIC VITAMINS do not work.
Most vitamins/ supplements on the store shelf are synthetic, esp. B vitamins. Folic acid is a B vitamin (most people are deficient in this). Synthetic vitamins, like folic acid, will temporarily boost the cells. HOWEVER, have you noticed that on these B vit synth supplements the dosage is like 3000% the RDA?? That is because they are synthetic. They have to overdose you or your cells won’t ABSORB the stuff.
The point is that synthetic folic acid works for a temp. fix, but eventually damages DNA (German biophysicists have proven this). These synthetics are difficult to absorb and have minimal long term benefit (in fact, they can make the liver worse).
SO, the TRUTH is that WHOLEFOOD NON SYNTHETIC SUPPLEMENTS OFTEN WORK MIRACLES. But MDs and big pharma don’t want you to know that, or they themselves do not know it. They ALWAYS use synthetic supplements with their studies, which makes them appear to be bunk (they have done this with vit. E). However, sometimes things like folic acid, even when synthetic, show a little improvement.
As sources below I’ll list some wholefood vitamin companies that tell you WHY tablets are toxic and only veg. capsules are ok for the liver. Avoid synthetic supplements and only use LIVE SOURCE.
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http://www.healthline.cc
http://www.newchapter.com
First medical doctors are not trained in nutrition, they are trained in the use of drugs. So, they don’t really know a lot about it.
But, there is a some truth with some vitamins not being used by the body. In the 30s, the first "isolated" vitamins were experimented with. They were trying to find out if a vitamin could work like a drug. Ie. B1, B6 as separate vitamins. They started to make these in the labs. This has continued to this day.
The body runs on food. The body does not recognize these artificial vitamins and thus they are not absorbed, or absorbed poorly.
Whole food supplements are made from food and have all the cofactors needed to be used by the body. They body recognizes it and uses it.
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Before I respond to other recent posts here, let me just give a general answer to this question. Vitamin supplements are only necessary if you have a deficiency (perhaps caused by pregnancy). If you are not in need of the extra vitamins, they will be excreted from your body. The common myth that vitamins are a miracle pill that everyone should eat like candy, is false. Enough vitamins are usually consumed in the food you eat, and once you eat enough you don’t need more. That’s not really the same thing as most prescribed medications. Prescribed medications do not "supplement" a biological process that doesn’t need supplementing. They have a specific dose that produces a specific and calculated effect in the body, and are taken for that specific reason.
Oldtimekid, Dustcart44, and Minerva…. All this conspiracy theory stuff about the evil drug companies and MD’s is utter nonsense. I understand that its easy to dislike big corporations, especially those that manufacture and sell expensive medications. But you are all being clouded by your political ideals…in other words, you want to hate big pharma so badly that you’ll believe in these conspiracies, despite how ludacris it really is. Certainly pharma companies have their faults (like we all do), but they aren’t "evil" like you claim. Nor are the MD’s that you think are in bed with them. Do you really think the MD’s that live in your neighborhoods and communities are out to make a few extra bucks by screwing over their friends and family? Think about how many people like you hate big pharma. That kind of news story would be on the front page. All it would take is one ethical doctor to blow the whistle on a big conspiracy like that. But just for the sake of argument, let’s assume there is a slight chance you might be right about one or two corrupt doctors. That doesn’t explain why the other 99.99% of MD’s also prescribe medications in much the same way. What are they doing it for? I don’t suppose it might have something to do with empirical evidence? Aside from that, we are still ignoring the fact that nearly every self-proclaimed "expert" that promotes supplements, is also selling them. Therefore, making a direct profit from you taking them. Keep in mind that it is absolutely illegal for MD’s to make money off the prescriptions they write.
Oldtimekid – I don’t know how many times I’ve seen you post comments that M.D.’s don’t get trained on nutrition. That is simply not true. I can’t speak to the level of education you received, but I don’t think you can accurately speak to the education of an MD either. What happens when a hospitalized patient needs parenteral nutrition? How would a MD be able to prescibe the individualized TPN solution that is needed for that patient? That type of calculation has to be a lot more precise than what is required of your job. I know you’ll continue to sell oral vitamin supplements to people that aren’t deficient. And you’ll continue to think you’re saving the world.
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Money and ignorance.
Minerva’s got it right. Look into nutrition and eat your fruit and veg. Where do you think the vitamins come from in the first place?
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