A Primer for Vitamin Workshop 101

This Harvard medical related vitamin and mineral resource presents a very good starting point for vitamin knowledge, including a number of supplement precautions. But, more detail is needed to clarify the points raised, plus some vital points missed. These necessary explanations form the premise for the existsnce of Vitamin Workshop 101.

Consumers face a mountain of choices in vitamin supplement decisions.  Today, this is more of a challenge than at any time in the past. And one that few people have the time to adequately evaluate on their own. Even Scientists and Doctors have disagreements as to proper vitamin and mineral protocols. Contradictory research results are often behind such disagreements. To say a blind faith belief governs most vitamin choices is unfortunately an inescapable reality. Take this simple Vitamin Quiz and see for yourself.

Before you take another Vitamin...

Everyone needs some guidance. After a reasonably thorough examination of scientific resources (10,000) and existing vitamin websites left helpful and honest guidance information painfully inadequate, this website sprang to life.

CAUTION: Ideally, discussing health issues with your medical professional is a top priority. Hopefully, they have educated themselves in proper supplement usage. Medical school offerings in nutrition are lacking and the unfortunate reality is that very few medical professionals have such knowledge. This leaves people on their own to discover with very limited avenues the needed vital healthy vitamin information. While this website has some short-comings, it just might be one of the best researched go to websites to serve as a stepping stone for continuing vitamin truth education.  

Example: 10% of people do not produce the elements necessary to convert sunshine into the needed vitamin D3 form. Up to another 40% have various limited abilities. Finding out if you are influenced by this defective gene (or genes) gives better guidance for supplement dosages, forms, and the need to have levels tested. pages

       VITAMIN THEORIES: Sense out of Nonsense

Vitamin theories and facts today are as misleading as they were over 50 years ago. Some of the same myths still exist and new ones have emerged. Plus, long term scientific research is now challenging some old established "theories" and should soon be updating vitamin facts and initiating changes in vitamin product formulas. This is how the scientific method is suppose to evolve and improve health. But instead, today there is a built-in resistance to change in mainstream medicine that is potentially jeopardizing your health.

Intelligent vitamin choices have the power to optimize health.  Unfortunately, unwise choices may compromise health over time. DO YOU KNOW THE DIFFERENCE? Where would you look to find this relatively new but extremely vital knowledge?

       ...novel vitamin concepts...

This author asked these same questions 20 (now 31) years ago and, failing to find any constructive unbiased answers amid growing vitamin ambiguity, began the scientific research leading to this website. Now, after 20 years of reading thousands of scientific journal articles, here are some novel and insightful vitamin concepts that so far are not conveyed together on any other resource. Current scientific vitamin research coupled with human physiology and some good old-fashion common sense form the backbone for this new vitamin criteria.  See for yourself if the conclusions manifested after reading the supporting research studies don't validate these positions.  

Included here is the official website (http://ods.od.nih.gov) of the U.S. Government from the Office of Dietary Supplements, a part of the National Institutes of Health. There are excellent nutrient databases and fact sheets, but missing are the more controversial new scientific discoveries that must still be under development and not yet verified or offered for public discussion. The next reference lists some of these, but still needs clarifications found in other articles on this website. ref  

YOU CAN JUST FOLLOW THIS NEW VITAMIN CRITERIA WHICH ALREADY HAS FACTORED INTO IT MOST IF NOT ALL OF THESE ISSUES, OR YOU CAN DIVE DEEPER TO GAIN A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE WHY AND HOW FOR THESE CONCEPTS TO MAXIMIZE YOUR INTELLIGENT VITAMIN SUPPLEMENT CHOICES. Use the SEARCH key to find subjects of interest.

Not everyone is affected the same by nutritional aspects. You might go quite some time, maybe a lifetime, before any of these issues become manifested in unhealthy conditions. Some people are blessed with stronger immune systems and better genetics. Yes, the body has adaptive mechanisms to deal with "unbalanced" nutrient ratios, often for a long period of time, but this takes energy and nutrients away from other vital functions. You may be gambling with your health.

SOME EXAMPLES TO EXPLAIN AREAS OF VITAMIN INFLUENCE  

• First, dosages matter. More is not always better. ref Adverse effects for many vitamins and minerals are possible at both deficiency levels as well as at excessive amounts. i.e.- Selenium at 200 mcg on increasing diabetes rate if body levels already at high end.
• Next, scientific methods have detailed and specific protocols as to how to express vitamin study results. There are major abuses in some past research conclusions. Far too many unscientific generalizations and assumptions exist. i.e.- If a synthetic vitamin E is used in a study, the results cannot be applied to natural vitamin E due to significant differences between the two forms. A Johns Hopkins study about vitamin E on mortality did not reveal how the study participants died or if the causes were even those influenced by vitamin E actions. Yet, the conclusion reached was that 400IU and larger doses of vitamin E will kill you at greater rates than not taking vitamin E. (Should have only applied to synthetic vitamin E if that was form used in studies.)
• There are many missed synergistic vitamin connections necessary for proper functions. i.e.- Vitamin D needs magnesium, a particular form of vitamin A (9-cis), and vitamin K2, before calcium gets deposited into bones attached to a vitamin D produced protein, Osteocalcin. Vitamin E needs all family members for complete health protection. Article
• Vitamins and minerals often have unique and different functions in various body areas and health conditions. i.e.- Vitamin D on bone strength, blood sugar control, and cancer prevention 
• Although not all aspects of vitamins have been studied yet, there are enough study results to make some definitive decisions for challenging many up to now long term assumed theories. i.e.- Women and men can respond differently to same nutrient in study. Calcium generally helps women while too much is not beneficial for men with prostate problems. article
• Old Vitamin theories and many multiple-vitamin products are now known to exhibit far too many flaws which can jeopardize health. Most vitamin manufacturing companies, like professional nutritional agencies, have simply been too slow to respond and make changes to conform with the new science.
• Many Vitamins have seemingly opposing functions. Vitamin D can tear down bone while at the same time initiating the process to rebuild new bone.
• Some Vitamins have counterbalancing functions to other vitamins as a method or process to control metabolism rates. As active Vitamin D begins to breakdown, one of the breakdown forms turns off the activation of more Vitamin D.  

VARIATION OF VITAMIN EFFECTS Explained

Not everyone is affected the same by nutritional aspects. You might go quite some time, maybe a lifetime, before any of these issues become manifested in unhealthy conditions. Some people are blessed with stronger immune systems and better genetics. Yes, the body has adaptive mechanisms to deal with "unbalanced" nutrient ratios, often for a long period of time, but this takes energy and nutrients away from other vital functions. You may be gambling with your health.

REMEMBER: No two people are exactly alike. Yes, twins are very close. You are a product of your ancestors and not only pass on a certain genetic code, but also any mutations that occur along the way. Scientists are finding many mutations that influence how the body processes and uses vitamins. Vitamin D has many such genetic changes that interfere and limit sunshine D production and conversion. Certain altered genes can increase disease rates like BRAC1 and BRAC2 on breast cancer. ref (some modification may be possible with diet, lifestyle, and immune watch-dogs)

Biological individuality is a factor Scientists have difficulty controlling and factoring into study results. Nutrition is part Science and part Art. The Science part is pretty cut and dried, nuts and bolts. The Art part is due to biological individuality. How the nuts and bolts of science will react in each individual can be similar or seemingly worlds apart. Thus, that makes it more like Art than Science and Scientists and the scientific method are not really set up to deal with variations of Art.

IMPORTANT CONSIDERATIONS 

AUTHOR INSIGHTS:  Health and Vitamins, similar to life in general, don't always fit into nice neat black and white facts and theories. An important concept to remember in reading this website is that when reading science study reports, everything is a matter of degrees. And most vitamin research results concern quite small degrees and often only affect a limited number of people with either noticeable benefits or adverse effects. The majority of test subjects are largely unaffected. A 50% reduction in cancers doesn't mean 50% of the people in the test group, but simply the difference between the number of cancers in the test subjects versus the number in controls. This could be as few as 2 out of 10,000 or as large as 50 or more, rarely. Although any decrease or increase in disease rates is significant since we are talking about people's lives. 

One more thing needs to be addressed. Health concepts developed in the 20th century had many flaws since the young science at the time hadn't yet uncovered all the vital facts. Today modern medicine is still significantly influenced by many of these "original" flawed theories. Some of them such as the germ theory worked quite well in dealing with the many infectious diseases at the time, but fail in the modern world with degenerative diseases dominating. Yet mainstream medicine tenaciously hangs onto old unworkable theories, unable or unwilling to let go and admit such major shortcomings of the past.

This website simply attempts to find truths, as close to the actual reality as possible. Until clarification exists for many still controversial vitamin issues, the Precautionary Principle for taking vitamin supplements should be in play.

Basic Vitamin Stuff

These Vitamin considerations are often overlooked and some rarely mentioned, but could be vitally important factors:

• Vitamins are available in different forms such as natural or synthetic or with a different combining element, usually an acid. article
• Whether natural or synthetic can influence study results. Study results that used a synthetic form may not apply to a natural vitamin form (for vitamins with a difference)
• Some vitamins have major differences between natural and synthetic, others, not so much down to barely any. 
• Some Vitamins, like C & E, have related family members often found together in nature that have synergistic as well as complementary actions.
• Vitamin supplements are concentrated. The amount of vitamins in some supplements is equal to the amount found in many pounds of food. The body is simply not designed to handle such large amounts at one time. Disruptions can occur in vital functions as the body attempts to maintain balance. 

These large vitamin dosages may cause the body to slowly develop new pathways to deal with these concentrated amounts.  This might include calling up unique hormones or new and extra enzymes to either slowdown the absorption rate or speed up the elimination. Large amounts of vitamin C generate new enzymes that increase the vitamin C breakdown and elimination. With extra calcium, the body is simply overwhelmed to the point that the large calcium loads block the absorption sites for other vital minerals. The Kidneys have to overwork and attempt to re-balance mineral loads. While this is a safeguard the body has developed methods to handle, the extra energy these processes consume takes energy and nutrients away from more important vital processes.       

• Vitamin supplement nutrients usually lack natural buffers found in food. Buffer elements, such as fibers, help control release and absorption aspects plus help maintain synergism of balance. The body uses many nutrients at the same time for metabolism and to form needed elements such as enzymes. Nature developed about as many negative absorption hindrances compared to enhancers of absorption for nutrients, partly to help balance nutrient loads, but especially to prevent overloads of some nutrients like iron. Iron can be toxic at some intake levels. Fat soluble nutrients are often separated into different foods to help assimilation by preventing interference of one vitamin over another, sort of like more ships arriving at the harbor than available docking spaces. This aspect is overwhelmed by many multiple supplement formulas at higher dosages. Higher Vitamin E intake hindering vitamin K absorption represents one of many vitamin on vitamin or mineral on mineral interferences.              
• Digestion usually breaks apart most food and supplement vitamin forms and other nutrients. Some Vitamin companies attempt to use compounds formed during product development to suggest advantages for their products. While there may be some benefits for absorption, many are not that significant, sometimes only a difference of 5-6 percentage points for amounts absorbed. But it could also represent a 300% difference, usually only found with fat emulsification factors for fat soluble vitamins and nutrients like CoQ10 or curcumin.

• Nature uses variety in food choices to more or less balance nutrients over time according to body wisdom. Continuously taking the same multiple vitamin formula could quickly upset this balancing plan. "Stimulus Variation" is a term coined by this website to represent how the body is designed to adapt to periodic fluctuations in nutrient amount intakes that keep the body responsive by fine tuning balancing mechanisms.
  • Example: Since nature packs more potassium than sodium in food by over 10 to 1, the body adapted mechanisms to hold on to sodium more than it did for potassium. But today, chefs have reversed this ratio in prepared foods and the body suffers having to deal with such an imbalance of the two minerals since both minerals are important at proper amounts. ref  ref  ref  ref  

• Supplements are often engineered by design to bypass nature's protective absorption roadblocks. There often is a valid reason for these roadblocks, especially against some potentially damaging supplemental form nutrients like iron or the micro-nutrients zinc, copper, manganese, and selenium that are only needed in small amounts. There are adverse effects for both deficiencies and excesses of these nutrients as well as for some others. Both dosage and nutrient form have to be factored into formula considerations. Far too many multiple vitamin formulas fail this vital challenge.                                                                                                                                        
• As vitamin supplement dosages increase, there is a greater likelihood of nutrient on nutrient interference, either hindering absorption or limiting activities. Some formulas have nutrients that interact and hinder the absorption of other nutrients. Vitamin E over vitamin K, Calcium over iron, zinc over copper, etc. Sometimes these actions are little more than just rhetoric, but at larger dosages they can have adverse effects. Unfortunately, the results for some of these effects may not be discovered for many years. A diet with variety of foods and lower dosage supplement brands often overcomes this factor.

Putting Vitamin facts in a simple Perspective

Imagine you are putting together a 100 piece puzzle. The level of current mainstream vitamin knowledge is equal to about 85 pieces. This website gives you about 8 additional critical pieces which add enhanced synergism to vital picture sections. Thus, you only need to find the missing 7 to complete. The last 7 are mainly individualized pieces and would include things like blood workup, genetic profile, plus actual health history identifying body weak links. And of course the yet to be discovered vitamin health connections.

End of Vitamins - Question & Answer

IS THIS THE END OF VITAMIN SUPPLEMENTS?

ANSWER:

Apparently not yet according to sales. People still want to believe in the value of their vitamins. NEGATIVE MEDIA REPORTS from rather large studies that vitamins do not prevent disease have yet to significantly tarnish this belief.

This author has discovered another scenario that simply explains "the why" behind many of these negative vitamin studies. After 50 years of combing through and analyzing over 10,000 scientific vitamin research studies* and mixing that information in with human anatomy & physiology, a new vitamin reality has emerged that challenges the premise of many past vitamin perceptions and their resulting flaws incorporated into current vitamin formulas.

CORRECT THESE FLAWS AND MANY OF THE NEGATIVE STUDIES COULD DISSAPPEAR. 

Vitamins do have vital roles to play in health. But, somewhere along the vitamin scientific development trail, Scientists ventured too far off nature's path and left out human physiology. Could Scientists simply be studying the wrong form of some vitamins? And what about the proper dosage for the study condition? Or are multiple vitamin formulas simply missing vital symbiotic nutrients that are needed for positive results? Both too little and too much of many vitamins and minerals can exhibit adverse events. A puzzle needs all pieces fitting together. Are Scientists studying an incomplete vitamin picture?  

SIDEBAR: Change the above questions into factual statements and that represents exactly the scenario that the articles on this website with the Scientific study links in support will reveal. A hypotheses: There are simple ways to make vitamins more effective and efficient plus to also reduce potential adverse possibilities.

Vitamin ingredient quality and standards over time have rolled downhill. Many supplement minerals come from rocks. Better mineral forms are from plants that take in the rock minerals and process them into a more living format. Many vitamins are synthesized from oil. Do they differ from vitamins made in food? Rock minerals and synthetic vitamins do work to a certain degree, but there are more effective formats. Plus, have dosages increased past natural safeguard points? Do any of these differences really matter?

One other pressing issue needing an explanation now is how can vitamin supplements find redemption after so many large adverse studies and negative media exposure?

Well, yes they can, but only if the Public is first given the real vitamin truths. A logical analysis needs to combat past faulty vitamin premises. And there are far too many. Forms and Dosages matter. Nature exhibits a profound wisdom putting together related and synergistic nutrients in food. Scientists and Nutritionists simply have ventured too far from those balance points. This is the simple realization offered according to the results of recent scientific vitamin research and a few unique old ones. And it is truly a magical story, filled with mystery and intrigue. Discovery awaits you in the 270 essay type articles on this website with over 1000 scientific reference links to help establish the new vitamin reality. article  Buckle up!

* Many of the most revealing vitamin studies are still in the Science underground and have not yet became part of the Public Spectrum. This could be your first exposure to many of them. Health Institutions need to incorporate this work into updating vitamin protocols and Public recommendations. Why has this beneficial information remained difficult to find and not yet used to increase Public Health?

PRECAUTIONARY PRINCIPLE:  Much of the science presented here is what would be called young science. It needs to mature with greater number and size of studies TO VERIFY. Plus, there are still some vitamin topics that have yet to even be studied so proper determinations for correct dosages and forms or related synergism are still guesstimates. Also there could be other body conditions that interact which need to be factored in but are also not recognized yet. Thus, this new vitamin reality is and will always be a work in progress. Talk to your medical team and listen to your body.

NO! This is not the end of vitamin supplements. BUT, it should be the end to many of the flaws.

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HEALTH REALITY

          People are not very healthy living in the USA according to disease stats compared to many other Countries.

This is as simple as it gets:

1. Culture in many if not most developed Countries is counter-productive to building health, especially in the United States.
2. The American or modern diet in countless Scientific research shows it does not support health over the long term. (1 in 3 get cancer, 1 in 2 get heart disease) 
   
3. Your thoughts can manifest into body processes in both positive and negative directions.
4. Supplements have to fit-in and support human physiology.***  

First, the body is designed to move. Modern culture is designed to curtail movement. Labor saving devices: Automobiles, motorcycles, scooters, dish washers, car washes, Gardeners, Painters, etc. Watching sports dominates playing.

Second, food production methods have changed the nutrient content of food:  Cattle eating grains in feed lots instead of pasture grass, caged animals fed artificial chemicals and antibiotics, fried foods in re-used oils, and residues from synthetic fertilizers and pesticides.

Third, fresh foods are giving way to cooked, frozen, and processed foods. Some use the terms live or dead foods. The enzymes in fresh foods are not given the significance they deserve for maintaining health.

***Now this is really at the heart of all vitamin issues. Supplemented nutrients have to complement body functions and processes rather than upset or interfere. Drugs are designed to mostly interfere. Disturbances can be in either over-stimulation or under-expression directions. Two of the largest mis-clues for physiological understanding are with the nature of the antioxidant/redox balance and also in the maintenance of blood calcium levels to protect bones.

Here are the most important factors to consider:

1. For Health, the body needs to stay under a 5 to 1 intake ratio for Omega 6 to Omega 3 fats. Foods in the past simply more or less exhibited this ratio. But with the food production methods and choices today, this ratio has increased to 10-1 or greater, up to 20 to 1 in some diets. Since a higher ratio can increase chronic inflammation, many degenerative diseases are linked to this one fact. Fish contains omega 3 and so did beef from cattle when fed only on pasture grass. Cows in feedlots eating grains dramatically reduce their omega 3 meat fat content.
2. Sugar is far too concentrated to be consumed in the quantities of today. Over 100 pounds a year. The body's complex glucose/insulin controls cannot handle this amount and may breakdown creating the metabolic syndrome factors and eventually diabetes. This complex system has triggers other than sugars as well.
3. Farming methods are reducing nutrient content. Kansas wheat has lost 25% or more of its protein content. Minerals are both increased and reduced by modern farming methods plus refined out of many foods increasing deficiencies, especially for magnesium and potassium, while sodium is often in excess since salt is added to many prepared foods.
4. Calcium is fortified in so many foods that it is now creating problems which scientists are failing to attach to it, or to its pathway influences directed by vitamin D levels.

Established medicine approaches disease by treating symptoms and seldom addresses or corrects causes. Imagine how quickly this would reverse if Doctors were paid a monthly fee only while you were HEALTHY and not if you became sick.

Plus, Modern nutrition is failing to adequately educate people as to the truths of disease causing factors and conditions, plus the pitfalls of culturally evolving dietary patterns. There is some lip service to a few of the associations, but many go unacknowledged. There are small segments in the health food and vitamin industry that attempt to bring some of these health concepts to light, but usually only the ones favorable to selling vitamins get widespread reporting.

This website attempts to simply explain these conditions by offering logical explanations and support so you can better understand nutrient roles. Sometimes these are positive but can also be negative so it is paramount that all sides are presented as truthfully as possible given the current scientific research. Unfortunately, not all aspects of nutrition have research answers. Here, a common sense interpretation of physiology and human anatomy with a best guess as to how nutrients might fit. Opinions! Science has many pertinent vitamin questions yet to research and answer.

Health Theory Development

HEALTH THEORY DEVELOPMENT is an important concept to nail down. It reveals why it is not only very difficult to construct and prove vitamin theories, but that this is an arena that lends itself to widespread fraudulent studies.  

Analytical applications for Developing New Vitamin Health Theories

      Flaws in understanding human physiology perpetuate faulty vitamin function theories leading to incorrect research results plus mistakes in vitamin forms and dosages.

    Here are bullet examples of these FALSE premises (simply not true):

• Water soluble B vitamins are safe because in excess they are flushed out of the body 
  • Excess Vitamin B6 nerve damage (also with deficiency too)
  • Excess Vitamin B6 on increased diuretic action leading to water elimination, dehydration
  • Excess Folic acid on reduction of killer cell activity and cancer acceleration
  • Excess Folic acid with low vitamin B12 on impairment of cognitive functions
  • Excess vitamin B1 on cancer cell multiplication and promotion                                           
• That excess anti-oxidants would prevent disease by limiting free radical damage  
  • Excess anti-oxidants limit positive functions for some radicals 
  • Excess of some anti-oxidants turn around their actions into pro-oxidants instead
• Taking extra vitamins always increases their function or activity 
  • Vitamins and minerals have a range of intakes that is optimal
  • Both too low as well as too high can generate detrimental effects
• Only the most active one of the 8 member vitamin E family is necessary or given vitamin E units 
  • Vitamin E is a family of 8 related forms, 4 tocopherols and 4 tocotrienols, alpha, beta, delta & gamma
  • While d'alpha tocopherol remains active the longest, the other 7 members have unique functions that d'alpha tocopherol does not perform, I.E. cholesterol reduction, dementia protection, cancer influence, nitrous oxide breakdown 
• Natural and synthetic vitamins are the same 
  • See this article for discussion why this statement is false
• The body has elaborate mechanisms to balance mineral levels so maintaining dietary ratios is not important 
  • Balance and ratio of minerals is corrected and maintained by the Kidneys
  • Minerals control pH, or acid & alkaline balance
  • This balance uses up energy and minerals in this process
  • This mineral balance activity takes them away from other important functions, like bone density
  • 2 cellular mineral pumps control balance of minerals within cells, the sodium/potassium and the calcium/magnesium pumps
  • These pumps and the mineral exchanges are necessary for muscle contraction, nerve impulses, enzyme actions, etc 
• The body has extensive balancing ability to maintain the acid / alkaline pH of blood, other fluids, and tissues within narrow ranges so dietary control of acid balance is unnecessary 
  • Yes, pH levels of tissues and fluids vary very little in the body, 
  • But the process for this maintenance takes energy and uses up minerals, either alkaline forming or acid forming
  • This use of minerals takes them away from other vital body functions
• Modern medicine, based on the germ theory, fails to satisfy all known and observed health and disease facts 
  • Immune system protection levels can vary from strong to weak against disease causing germs.
  • The medium or conditions inside the body, especially intestinal bacteria, either control and kill germs or feed and allow germs to grow in numbers and cause a disease. 
  • This explains why everyone exposed to the same germ may not become ill.
• Modern medicine's approach to heart disease control by lowering cholesterol is only partially correct 
  • Research is looking more at chronic inflammation as the chief cause since cholesterol levels vary widely in heart patients from low to normal to high
  • Cholesterol is needed to fight infections as well as control fluid movement into and out of cells
  • A person who takes drugs to lower cholesterol is more likely to develop infections during hospital care than a person with their naturally low or normal or high cholesterol levels.

Below is an attempt to show the multiple complex aspects of how vitamin functions interact and may be associated with the unfortunately common disease of breast cancer. 

Understanding Vitamin functions in Breast Cancer to clarify controversial findings in next article.