Doctor Recommended Nutritional Supplements

Doctor Recommended Nutritional Supplements

Supplements with more than marketing hype behind them.

Vitabase goes the extra mile to ensure that the products we sell are as safe and effective as possible. That is why every product in the Vitabase brand is individually reviewed by Dr. Kevin Passero, a licensed doctor of natural medicine. Dr. Passero has worked with some of the leading doctors in the field of natural medicine and is currently the Vice President of the Maryland Association of Naturopathic Physicians. We are proud to see his seal on our products.





Look for the Seal

"The approval seal is dedicated to specific products that demonstrate exceptional detail to formulation and ingredient selection. It verifies that I have personally reviewed the formula to assess the quality and quantity of each ingredient. Designing an exceptional formula requires that certain ingredients be present in sufficient enough quantities to be effective, while at the same time ensuring that those key ingredients are present at safe levels.

If you see a product with my seal, you can be confident that it meets the highest standards for quality and safety."

Dr. Kevin Passero, N.D.

Benefits of Nutritional Supplements

Many doctors and scientists once thought that you don't need to supplement with vitamins if you eat right. Victor Herbert, the outspoken Harvard nutrition scientist, was quoted in a famous 1992 Time magazine cover story about nutrition as saying that vitamins just gave one expensive urine. years later, in 1996, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) published regulations requiring the addition of folic acid to enriched breads, cereals, flours, corn meals, pastas, rice, and other grain products. This was in response to the realization that thousands of babies were being born with spina bifida because their mothers were not getting enough folate in their diet. Spina bifida is a neural tube defect that occurs in the first month of pregnancy when the spinal column doesn't close completely. Since many Americans eat flour products, and don't eat enough leafy green vegetables, this strategy has saved thousands of lives.

While overall improvement in dietary habits can be key to the promotion of heath and disease prevention, scientists and health care professionals increasingly recognize that nutritional supplements also play an important role. The evidence is now clear that in order to maintain proper health the human body requires at least 40 essential micronutrients (vitamins, minerals, and other biochemicals), and that diet alone is very often inadequate to provide these nutrients. It has been estimated that every year there are 14 million cases of preventable heart disease, 1.2 million preventable cases of cancer, more than half a million preventable strokes and thousands of babies born with neural tube defects that could have been prevented by a simple vitamin.

Supplements Should be an Integral Part of a Healthy Diet

The 2000 edition of The Dietary Guidelines for Americans, published by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Department of Health and Human Services, recognizes that some people need a vitamin-mineral supplement to meet specific nutrient needs. A recent policy statement by the American Dietetic Association also parallels this advice.

Drs. Walter Willett and Meir Stampfer of Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Public Health recently advised, based on their research and expertise, that a daily multivitamin makes sense for most adults. Two other Harvard physicians, Dr. Kathleen Fairfield and Dr. Robert Fletcher concluded that it is prudent for most adults to take a multivitamin to reduce the risk of not receiving enough essential nutrients through their diet. Dr. David Heber of the UCLA Center for Human Nutrition recently suggested that consumers think of the basic four supplements - a multivitamin, extra vitamin C, extra vitamin E, and calcium - as an integral part of their diet in addition to the four basic food groups.

All of these recommendations confirm the importance of daily supplementation.

You should know that recommended dietary allowances (RDAs) were developed as a minimum standard simply to prevent classic acute deficiency diseases such as scurvy, beriberi and pernicious anemia and do not fully address the prevention of chronic metabolic damage. At the WellMax Clinic, I have examined hundreds of patients. Many of these patients had elevated homocysteine levels, despite taking a multivitamin. In most cases, the multivitamin was the typical 100 RDA type with a low dosage of vitamin B6, vitamin B1 (thiamine) and other important B-complex vitamins. By simply switching these patients to a better non-RDA based formulation, that contained more of the B-complex vitamins, their homocysteine level came down by over 20. What does all this mean? It means that following RDA guidelines alone is not an effective nutrition based health promotion strategy.

As a doctor who wants the best health for you, I'm not interested in considering the question, what is the minimum amount of zinc or folate that would likely be adequate for you to prevent disease? That's the wrong question! The optimum amount of folate or zinc that is truly required by your body is the amount that maximizes a healthy lifespan, and this amount is higher than the amount needed to prevent acute deficiency disease.

We're Not All Same

RDAs also don't address the fact that as human beings we each have varying nutritional requirements. There are two obvious reasons why different people need different amounts of nutrients. First, and foremost, not everyone eats the same things. Although some of the experts in the past told us that a balanced diet had all the nutrients one needs, even if it were true (and it is not true), many Americans eat processed foods, and often have little variation in their diet. The federal government invested millions of dollars in a campaign to get people to eat five servings of fruit or vegetables every day. It has not been very effective. Eighty percent of American children and adolescents and 68 of adults do not consume the recommended five portions per day. Although our ancestors had a limited amount of food, we now have ample calories without micronutrients, especially in fried foods and in carbohydrates found in soft drinks. Consequently, and quite obviously, the USA and other countries have an epidemic of obesity associated with a shortage of micronutrients.

Secondly, an optimal intake of vitamins and nutrients varies with one's genetic constitution. Although most of us have two eyes and one nose, inside, our metabolic systems are very different. This variation in our genetic makeup has been termed biochemical individuality. The human body has hundreds of enzymes (little machines made of protein) that help detoxify, i.e. break down chemical compounds. What does a vitamin do? Vitamins are co-enzymes, or precursors for co-enzymes. Many enzymes function poorly, if at all, without their co-enzyme, i.e. vitamin.

A deficiency of vitamins B12, B6, folic acid, niacin, C or E, or inadequate intake of iron or zinc, appears to mimic radiation in damaging DNA (Ames and Wakimoto, 2002). And half the population may be deficient in at least one of these micronutrients (Ames, 2003). Folate deficiency - severe enough to cause measurable chromosome breaks - was present in about 25 of the US population prior to the addition of folate to bread a few years ago. Although fortification is useful, it is extremely slow (the problems of spina bifida and folate were well known for over 20 years prior to the fortification). In addition, fortification does not allow for the differences among groups of individuals. For example, as many as 25 of menstruating women are not getting enough iron, yet many men and older women have iron levels that are too high.

Vitamin B6 deficiency has been linked to prostate cancer [43-IFM] and lung cancer [44-IFM]. Vitamin C protects against stomach cancer [IFM-21, 47, 49]. Inadequate zinc in human cultured cells causes DNA damage (due to oxidation). Selenium deficiency has been linked to prostate cancer. Cervical cancer has been linked to elevated homocysteine levels [ifm-45], and homocysteine levels drop dramatically with B vitamin supplementation.

Brain function, i.e. cognition, requires micronutrients. Supplementation with micronutrients has improved cognitive function in children. Low intake of the B vitamins contributes to Alzheimer's disease.

As you may already know, and as many medical professionals will attest, B vitamins as well as a few others vitamins are water soluble, so excess amounts are excreted in the urine. But do not be fooled into thinking that increased amounts of essential vitamins in the urine mean that too much was taken in the first place. Vitamin supplementation, even with water-soluble vitamins, increases people's blood levels of those nutrients. Dr. William Kaufman [ref] addressed the expensive urine claim raised by Victor Herbert in 1992, the same year Time magazine published the phrase:

During the early part of World War II, GI's whose severe wound infections were treated with penicillin had to save all their urine so that the penicillin which had been excreted in their urine could be recovered and then used to treat other GI's with life threatening wound infections. If one only considered the penicillin that was excreted in the urine and not the benefits that the GI had in having his infection cured by penicillin, one could sneer that penicillin's only function was to give the GI expensive urine. If one considered only the function of penicillin in the GI's body, one would have to marvel at the miracle of its curing a potentially lethal infection.

The two-liner attributed to Dr. Victor Herbert in the Time magazine's vitamin article We get all the vitamins we need in our diets. Taking supplements only gives you expensive urine completely overlooks the benefits vitamin supplements can produce in our bodies before being excreted in our urine. Compelling scientific evidence supports the beneficial effects of daily, long-term use of vitamins and nutritional supplements. Though some studies identify benefits only in people who have supplemented for a number of years, other studies show specific benefits after only a short period of use. It is never too late to incorporate rational nutritional supplementation into an overall healthy lifestyle, and it is never too late to start living healthy. However, evidence suggests that maximum benefit of supplementation accrues to those who persist in their use of key supplements.

Key Nutritional Supplements

They majority of the evidence available today indicates that multivitamins with mega B-complex vitamins (including folic acid), antioxidants including vitamins C and E, calcium and vitamin D, along with long chain omega-3 fatty acids (found in fish oil supplements) provide the greatest protection against poor health and infectious illnesses as well as more dangerous health conditions including birth defects, hip fractures (osteoporosis), macular degeneration, heart disease, stroke, cancer and many more. However, the potential gains can only be realized if you are vigilant in your nutritional supplementation regimen.

Multivitamins

Ever heard the phrase you are what you eat? What you eat is an important determinant of how you feel, how effectively you function, how clearly you think, how well your body fends off infection, how well you can see, how well you protect yourself against chronic disease, and ultimately how long you live. Yet what most people eat is determined by convenience or habit rather than by consideration for their body's nutritional needs. In combination with a healthy lifestyle and balanced diet a daily multivitamin can benefit virtually everyone.

A good multivitamin with minerals will fill small nutrient deficiencies (or gaps), protect health, improve overall function, and help prevent disease - for less than a dollar a day. Can you think of a better use of your change that can provide such a high potential payoff? I can't.

For coverage that is more complete, you should consider adding other key supplements, including vitamin C, vitamin E and calcium. NutraSanus Vit-essentialsT Basics is a daily multivitamin with minerals designed to be taken in combination with calcium vitamin E. I know of no other multivitamin on the market that is better than Vit-essentialsT Basics and it is the multivitamin of choice that I recommend to my patients.

Yet more evidence suggests that there are additional benefits to be gained by incorporating carotenoids such as lutein, antioxidant minerals such as selenium (contained in Vit-essentialsT Basics), and long chain omega-3 fatty acids such as EPA and DHA (found in Nutrasanus fish oil) into a healthy lifestyle.

Fish Oil and Long Chain Omega-3 Fatty-Acids

A recent symposium [Omega-3 Fatty Acids: Recommendations for Therapeutics and Prevention Symposium, Institute of Human Nutrition, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York.] revealed some amazing facts about DHA and fish oil. These were elegantly summarized by Heather Hutchins, MS, RD [Medscape General Medicine 7(4):18, 2005. © 2005 Medscape]. I believe that these effects, by simply providing the body the nutrients it needs, are more powerful than any drug in saving lives! The emerging evidence supporting the potential health benefits of fish oil is truly astounding.

Brain function and fish oil. The human brain contains billions of neurons, and these are mostly fat. Sixty percent of the human brain is comprised of PUFAs (polyunsaturated fatty acids), mostly DHA (docosahexaenoic acid). However, studies indicate that individuals with dementia have lower plasma phospholipid DHA levels in the brain compared to controls.

Prospective studies have reported an intake of 180 mg or more DHA/day is associated with 50 decreased risk of dementia. Similar studies report consumption of at least 1 fish serving per week decreases risk of Alzheimer's disease by 60.

In the past, when we all used to eat a balanced diet, DHA was principally derived from fish. However, most Western diets no longer incorporate an adequate amount of fish.

DHA is also found in mother's milk and appears to be reason for the overall higher intelligence in children fed breast milk [Gamoh et al 1999-Review metab tune-up].

Heart and fish oil. The evidence for heart disease protection is amazing. The DART (Diet and Reinfarction Trial) study followed men after a heart attack. One group of patients took fish oil capsules providing 450 mg EPA and DHA per day; this group had a 62 reduction in CVD-related death and a 56 reduction in all-cause mortality.

The GISSI prevention trial, an Italian study of post-myocardial infarction patients, showed that after 3.5 years, those receiving n-3 fatty acids (850 mg/day) had a 20 reduction in overall mortality, 30 reduction in coronary mortality, and 45 reduction in sudden death.

Mood and fish oil. Omega 3 fatty acids have been shown to reduce risk of and help those with certain psychiatric disorders including depression, schizophrenia, and aggression/hostility; Dietary supplementation of 1 g/day of EPA appears to be effective in reducing psychotic, depressive and aggressive symptoms.

In a more recent study presented in March 2006 by University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine researchers discovered that omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids may influence mood, personality and behavior. In a study of 106 healthy volunteers, researchers found that participants who had lower blood levels of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids were more likely to report mild or moderate symptoms of depression, a more negative outlook and be more impulsive. Conversely, those with higher blood levels of omega-3s were found to be more agreeable.

Lipids, blood sugar, and fish oil. Studies suggest that fish oil supplementation may help keep lipid and blood sugar levels in check. In one study, three weeks of fish oil supplementation (1.1 g EPA and .7 g DHA/day) in healthy volunteers decreased insulin response to an oral glucose load by approximately 40, and lead to lower glucose oxidation and higher fat oxidation. In controlled trials, omega-3 supplementation has also been found to decrease triglyceride (TG) levels. One study even reported that supplementation of 4 g EPA/DHA per day for 6 weeks resulted in a 20 triglyceride decline in mildly hyperlipidemic middle-aged men.

Inflammation and fish oil. Why should fish oil be good for arthritis? Inflammation is mediated through eicosanoids (chemical messengers). Eicosanoids are built from long chain fatty acids. Inflammatory cells typically contain high proportions of arachidonic acid (AA) and low levels of other 20-carbon fatty acids (EPA), making AA the usual substrate for eicosanoid synthesis. Consumption of EPA and DHA results in increased uptake of these fatty acids into cell membrane phospholipid layers. Cells with higher DHA and EPA contents, as opposed to AA, produce fewer inflammatory eicosanoids, thus decreasing local and systemic inflammation.

I personally find this data astounding. Fish oil is an extremely potent health- promoting supplement! The average American diet only provides 100 mg EPA and DHA per day. This is 5 times less than the amount observed for cardiovascular benefit and also 5 times less than the WHO's current dietary recommendation for EPA and DHA.

While flax seed contains fats that can be converted to EPA, recent studies suggest that it does not convert as well as once thought, and many studies now demonstrate fish oil to be more effective than stand alone flax seed products. Recent advances in molecular distillation have allowed capsules containing omega-3s to be much more concentrated.

There is no risk of mercury toxicity in fish oil pills. However, the risk of excess mercury from eating fish is genuine. One can of tuna every week may exceed the toxic threshold limits set by the federal government. Large fish, high on the food chain, such as swordfish, shark, and tuna, as well as Atlantic salmon, may have significant mercury levels. The molecular distillation techniques for virtually all fish oil supplements include NutraSanus Super Omega eliminate mercury. You may find some expensive brands of fish oil touting mercury free but don't pay more for that claim alone; they're all mercury free.

Other Key nutritional supplements

While multivitamins, major vitamins (B-Complex, C and D), minerals (selenium, calcium, etc.) and omega-3 fatty acids provide the greatest health benefits there is also very compelling evidence to support the heath benefits of the following supplements:Consumers who choose to delve deeper into the dietary supplementation may also add botanical or herbal supplements for specific applications, or other types of specialty supplements.

But don't forget while I strongly believe in the power of nutritional supplements, nutritional supplementation alone is not the basis for good health. There are many other choices people make every day that are just as important. You should make every effort to get enough sleep, exercise regularly, avoid tobacco, maintain a healthy body weight, eat lots of fruits and vegetables, always choose whole grain products, select low fat foods and eat fish twice a week to maintain proper health. However, success in living a healthy lifestyle does not diminish the importance of proper supplementation.

A Word of Advice for Health Care Professionals

Health care professionals see many millions of patients every day yet fail to provide them with much needed nutritional advice. Unfortunately, many health professionals receive minimal nutrition education during their training and consequently may feel uncomfortable providing their patients with nutritional advice. Notwithstanding, one message that all health care professionals should share with their patients is that everyone can benefit from regular long-term use of a multivitamin, or multivitamin-mineral supplement.

An obstetrician seeing a woman who is planning to become pregnant should recommend she take a multivitamin containing B vitamin folic acid. The obstetrician should also recommend that the woman continue taking the multivitamin after she becomes pregnant or switch to a comparable prenatal vitamin (such as Vit-essentialsT Prenatal). Providing this simple bit of advice about the importance of folic acid can help prevent neural tube birth defects such as spina bifida.

And because most pregnancies are unplanned health care professionals who see women of childbearing age should recommend a multivitamin containing folic acid. The Food and Nutrition Board of the Institute of Medicine has recommended that all women capable of pregnancy should be taking a minimum of 0.4mg of folate daily from a multivitamin and most health professionals recommend much more. Remember, the critical period for the formation of the neural tube is during the first month of pregnancy, precisely when most women are unaware they are pregnant.

Physicians, nurses and the myriad of other health care professionals that come in regular contact with the elderly should take the opportunity to recommend a multivitamin. Elderly individuals, who are often prone to nutritional deficiencies, need the nutritional insurance a multivitamin provides to support a healthy immune system and to avoid other debilitating or possibly life threatening health conditions.

While evidence supporting the use of vitamin E is still developing, many doctors and researchers are convinced that vitamin E is a potent antioxidant that helps protect against heart disease by preventing oxidation of LDL cholesterol, which may lead to the formation of plaque buildup - the first step in the development of atherosclerosis. Vitamin E is a term that includes the family of compounds called tocopherols. Gamma tocopherols are the most important. Unfortunately, some epidemiologic research was performed using alpha tocopherol, and not the more important gamma tocopherol. Worse than d-alpha tocopherol is dl-alpha tocopherol which is a racemic mixture of synthetic compounds that should not be taken. It was no surprise to many nutritional experts in Vitamin E that patients taking alpha tocopherol, especially dl-alpha tocopherol, are not getting the benefits, and may even be harmed. Although I recommend mixed tocopherols or gamma tocopherols, I strongly recommend AGAINST taking pure alpha tocopherol. Check the labels! Nutrasanus has a mixed tocopherol product that has plenty of the delta and gamma tocopherols, and is an excellent product.

Multivitamins containing B complex, including vitamin B-12, vitamin B-2, vitamin B-6 and folic acid are also believed to help prevent heart disease and stroke by reducing homocysteine levels in the blood. It is not only reasonable but also advisable that cardiologists (many of which take a vitamin E supplement themselves) recommend that their patients incorporate a good multivitamin and vitamin E (mixed tocopherol) supplement into their daily diet. The cost is minimal and the potential benefits are huge.

You would assume that dieticians should be the most aware of the benefits of a rational supplementation program. However, many dieticians, under the erroneous belief that people who are given supplements will neglect their diet, focus solely on structuring food patterns while ignoring the benefit that supplementation can provide. Survey results show that people who take supplements are also more likely to pay attention to the quality of the food they eat and their lifestyle in general. The use of foods and supplements should be considered complimentary and I believe supplementation should be an important feature of dietetic practice.