Do you take multivitamin tablets?

SiHH said:
You speak nonsense.

They are there to SUPPLIMENT a diet which should already include fruit and vegetables and along with meat and fish.

They shouldn't be relied upon to fill the gap if you do not each the right amounts.

The only harm they do is to your wallet, other than that only you know if you need to take them or not (to the OP).
Click to expand...

Latest studies show that in the majority of people there is very little to no benefit from taking them. However, they are proven to be harmful to some groups of people, especially pregnant women and smokers, and you can easily "overdose" on certain vitamins or minerals if you are not careful which can cause adverse effects. So in summary, there is no real benefit gained from taking them if your diet is semi-decent, but there is a risk they could be bad for you.
 
I take them because my diet is horrendous. I do find they hold back coldsores though. Always around this year I'll get a coldsore, but I feel it coming on then have a multivit tab, and its gone. Helps a bit before bed after a night out aswell. Just had one now infact!
 
Several things to point out in this thread, not feeling "better", doesn't mean they aren't working. If your cells are dividing and multiplying, replacing old dying cells, you don't "feel" it, you don't feel it working better or worse but in the long term you might find yourself healthier in years to come as your body is, for want of a better word "regenerated" better over the years. Keep in mind the healthier you are the more efficiently your body replaces said dying cells and to a certain degree you could certainly be doing yourself a good thing in the long run.


Cod liver oil in excess is VERY dangerous due to the vitamin D overdose posibilities, its why omega fish oils and not cod liver oils are what you should take if you want omega oils, its also why you aren't recommended to eat real fish more than a few times a week, the vit D, not anything else. Omega's are used in pretty much every function in the body, not to mention your brain is made up mostly of omega fats and you'll find short term and long term benifits of eating a diet with a decent amount of omega's in. They'll help metabolism, heart functions, liver/kidney function, joints, just about anything else aswell.


But you need to keep this in mind for the people talking about a balanced diet meaning none of this is needed. Farmland is FAR less nutrient enriched than it used to be because we grow far more food far more quickly, it quite literally has less beneficial vitamins in that it used to. One of the key arguments with vitamins is that you won't absorb much from them anyway, this is true to a certain degree, whats also true is the vitamin content in vegetables is NOT all in easily absorbable form, infact cooked vegetables make many of the vitamins easier to absorb but again not fully, raw veg doesn't do a whole hell of a lot of good for you.

But more realistically we simply survive on a lot less vitamins than we've been led to believe so the "lessened" numbers from a vitamin tab aren't as bad as first thought. THen the reason vitamins from tablets aren't all easily absorbed, we didn't know what to take. If you take loads of calcium to strengthen your bones, you'll do almost nothing, without some copper you will absorb and use very little calcium, now calcium supplements have copper and normally potassium and some zinc in, the uptake has been increased massively. These are things people learn over time and decades ago we didn't know. Likewise most vitamins need the right balance of other things in them to make the body absorb them well.

In other words, our normal sources of vitamins are getting much worse, and our supplement versions due to more and more knowledge are getting far better. its why supplementing things like selenium, and omega's can be so important, because they were widespread 100 to 3000 years ago, and the levels have dropped dramatically in the past 100 years. you eat the same diet now as 100 years ago and you'll get almost no selenium, and far far less omega 3 and far far more omega 6, too much omega 6 and you won't absorb omega 3 that well.

its all about balance but our "natural" food's balance has been changing for decades, you need to account for this.
 
Nope I have no need to. For elderly people who struggle to eat properly and whose body cannot metabolise the nutrients from foods as readily it's a good idea. For healthy adults there should be no need unless you have a medical condition or your body lacks the ability of processing certain elements from food.
 
I take a multivitamin every day, along with glucosamine, cod liver oil, and krill oil (no vitamin d). If I don't take the vitamins I tend to get colds after long runs. With them my immme system appears to cope better. The other supps are because i'm too old and too heavy for my knees to cope without them.
 
footman said:
The medics/nutritionists are always saying its unnecessary if you have a balanced diet.
Click to expand...

erm not quite

medics will correctly tell you that they are unnecessary if you have a balanced diet

nutritionists on the other hand are the main promoters of these things and part of the reason behind food getting marketed as having lots of: vitamin C, anti oxidants or omega 3 oils. Thanks to all the pseudo science **** we are fed by nutritionists a lot of people are let to believe that its good for us to have more of these magic substances in our diet than we'd normally have anyway.
 
drunkenmaster said:
In other words, our normal sources of vitamins are getting much worse, and our supplement versions due to more and more knowledge are getting far better. its why supplementing things like selenium, and omega's can be so important, because they were widespread 100 to 3000 years ago, and the levels have dropped dramatically in the past 100 years. you eat the same diet now as 100 years ago and you'll get almost no selenium, and far far less omega 3 and far far more omega 6, too much omega 6 and you won't absorb omega 3 that well.
Click to expand...

This all sounds a bit like the sort of marketing you'd get from vitamin pill salesmen and nutritionists - do you have any links to actual academic research/papers to back this up at all? i.e. the claims that there are now less vitamins etc.. in veg and that due to this vitamin pills would be recommended.
 
I take high-strength vitamin c every day, as well as a tablet for my skin (they're called Clear Complexion or something). On top of this, though, I do try to eat at least two portions of fruit a day - I really don't think I could eat five :s
Been doing the above for a few months now, and my skin has got noticeably better! Although whenever I abstain for more than a day, the bad skin comes back :(
One supplement I avoid taking, although I need it, is iron. Causes painful bowel movements :(
I also eat fish every day - is this bad??
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom