Micronutrients: Essential in Tiny Amounts
Micronutrients: Essential in Tiny Amounts
Throughout most of evolution, food was our only source of vitamins and minerals. Today, however, the “one-a-day” multivitamin-mineral tablet is a kind of nutritional insurance policy for millions of Americans, whether they need it or not. In recent years it has been eclipsed by megadose formulations of individual micro nutrients supposedly capable of performing health miracles far beyond warding off the well-known deficiency diseases.
The Lift Sustaining Vitamins
Even as millions down a veritable alphabet soup’s worth of vitamin supplements each day, confusion and controversy surround these nutrients. There’s only one fact about which there is no argument: Vitamins are essential to good health. But which ones, for whom, and how much?
Vitamins are organic substances that are required in the diet in tiny amounts – altogether, less than an eighth of a teaspoon a day – to assist in your body’s processing of other major nutrients, protein, fats, and carbohydrates. In addition, certain vitamins participate in the formation of blood cells, hormones, nervous system chemicals, and genetic material. Most vitamins function as aids to enzymes. When a particular vitamin is missing from the diet or is present in inadequate amounts, characteristic deficiency symptoms develop.
The amount of each vitamin that the federal government recommends for daily consumption is based on how much is required to avoid any signs of deficiency in the average person, plus a substantial safety margin to take into account natural variations in individual needs and abilities to absorb consumed vitamins. However, a number of circumstances, including cigarette smoking, the use of certain drugs, various illnesses, old age, heavy use of alcohol, and pregnancy and lactation may increase a person’s need for certain vitamins beyond ordinary recommended amounts.
Users of oral contraceptives, for example, need extra B vitamins thiamine, niacin, pyridoxine, and B12 – and vitamin C. Heavy smokers need additional C, and heavy drinkers require more thiamine, niacin, pyridoxine, and folic acid than other people, even if they eat otherwise good diets. The elderly tend to absorb less of the B vitamins and vitamin C and so may need to consume extra amounts. Persons with obstructive jaundice, bowel diseases, or chronic diarrhea may absorb little of vitamins A, D, E, and K. Prolonged use of antibiotics can destroy the intestinal bacteria that normally produce several of our B vitamins and vitamin K. Following surgery, illness, injury, or extensive bums, the body’s need for vitamin C is increased.
It is commonly asserted that anyone who eats a “well-balanced diet” doesn’t need additional vitamins. Such a diet is described as including, each day, at least four servings of grain and cereal products, four or more servings of a variety of fruits and vegetables, two servings of dairy products, and two of meat, fish, poultry, or protein-rich legumes. Although this particular balance of foods certainly does not offer the only way to consume adequate vitamins, it is considered a reasonable guide for the average person.
Obviously we all don’t eat this way. For some people, such as those who eat erratically, those on strict low-calorie diets, those who rely primarily on heavily processed and canned foods, picky eaters, and vegetarians, a diet containing adequate amounts of vitamins may not be consumed. In these cases supplementing the diet with a multivitamin pill may be advisable.
However, improving one’s diet is clearly the preferred route to obtaining essential nutrients, since there is no pill that can completely compensate for the deficiencies in an inadequate or poorly balanced diet. And don’t assume that you don’t have to worry about what else you eat because you start each day with a vitamin-packed cereal. You can’t be sure how many of the vitamins in your bowl actually get into your body, and no cereal contains all the required vitamins in the needed proportions.
If you do need a vitamin supplement, with the exception of vitamin E, it matters not (except to the income of the seller) whether you buy “natural” or synthetic vitamins. The body can’t tell them apart. A molecule of vitamin C (ascorbic acid) is the same whether it originated in a rose hip or a chemistry lab. For vitamin E, the natural form is chemically different and slightly more active than synthetic versions.
There are thirteen undisputed vitamins – four that are soluble in fat and nine that are soluble in water – plus one to five other substances (including choline and inositol) that some assert are vitamins but that others say are not, since they are produced in the body in adequate amounts and no deficiency symptoms are associated with their absence in the diet.
The fat-soluble vitamins – A, D, E, and K – are generally consumed along with fat-containing foods. They are absorbed through the intestines with the aid of bile produced by the liver or fats in the diet. Because they are stored in your body’s fat , they do not necessarily have to be consumed each day.
Thus, a cooked carrot every other day, a cup of spinach every five days, or two ounces of beef liver once a week can fulfill an adult’s need for vitamin A. But also because they are stored, there is a danger of overdosing yourself with fat-soluble vitamins.
Water-soluble vitamins – eight B vitamins and C – present the opposite problem. The body has no storage depot for most of them, and they are continually being washed out with urine and sweat. Therefore, they should be consumed daily in adequate amounts to meet the body’s needs.