Breaking Vitamin E News

During the week of 11/10/04, a report linking Vitamin E supplementation with increased mortality in elderly and chronically ill patients was published in a major medical journal and reported by news outlets nationwide.

This study was published in the Annals of Internal Medicine ¹ and had several serious flaws that I will summarize below. It is extremely unfortunate that it received so much notoriety.

1. Most of the studies reviewed in this analysis used a synthetic Vitamin E supplement (dl-alpha-tocopherol) without the benefit of other supportive nutrients (such as vitamins C, B-complex, beta-carotene, and others).

2. When a single nutrient is given in high doses without the balance and support of other nutrients, it can disrupt the sensitive balance of antioxidants the body needs to maintain healthful function and energy production.

3. And finally, when choosing which studies to include in their analysis, the authors excluded the 12 trials with fewer than 10 deaths (18-29), 3 trials with unavailable mortality data (30-32), and 2 trials in which mortality data were not separated from a composite end point (33, 34). So after excluding the majority of trials with few if any deaths, they analyzed the remaining studies and concluded that the patients who took vitamin E supplementation had a slightly increased risk of death than the patients who did not. This was a very biased way to analyze the data.

I continue to recommend 400-800 units of natural Vitamin E supplementation to be taken as part of a balanced and complete antioxidant formula.

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¹ Edgar R. Miller, III , Roberto Pastor-Barriuso, Darshan Dalal, Rudolph A. Riemersma, Lawrence J. Appel, and Eliseo Guallar Meta-Analysis: High-Dosage Vitamin E Supplementation May Increase All-Cause Mortality Ann Intern Med 2004; 0: 0000605-200501040-00110-53

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