Vitamin Supplement

Women have special health needs at different stages of our lives. We may need a specific vitamin supplement for a woman at one stage of our life and need something completely different at another period. Doctors often prescribe vitamin and iron supplements for a woman who is expecting. If she does, take them as directed and do not alter the dose. While a lack of a particular vitamin can cause deficiencies, too much can result in toxicity.

When a vitamin supplement for a woman is recommended or prescribed it is because it contains the specific vitamin or vitamins a woman’s body needs. Your doctor will take into the account the amount of calcium and other nutrients that you need on a daily basis and make his recommendation.

You should familiarize yourself with the different vitamins and their role in your health. You want to know in what foods you can get certain vitamins and how much of each of the vitamins that your body needs. If you are taking a vitamin supplement for a woman because you are pregnant, you’ll want to investigate whether or not you’ll need one after you give birth.

If you have a disease or a condition that dictates you take a special vitamin supplement for a woman it may be something you always have to deal with. Your doctor can certainly advise you on this. However, in most cases, pregnancy notwithstanding, you should be able to get all the vitamins and minerals you need from a balanced diet. Your doctor can do a simple blood test to check the levels of certain vitamins in your system and whether or not you are deficient.

It is important to note that vitamins A, D, E and K are fat soluble. An excess amount of these vitamins are stored either in fatty tissue or the liver until needed. Because of this, toxicity can occur if too many vitamins are taken. While that rarely happens when we get our vitamins solely from the foods we eat, it can and does happen when we combine too many vitamin supplements with our diets. Discuss this with your doctor if you think you need a vitamin supplement for a woman.

Once you realize the different roles vitamins and minerals play in our overall health, it’s actually fun to keep up with the amount we are ingesting, either through the foods we eat or through supplements. In doing so, you will most likely find that your overall diet improves and the need for any additional supplements will be minimal.

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Vitamin supplements have been increasing in popularity and availability over the past 30 years. In North America it has become a multi - billion dollar industry. Vitamin supplements have been hailed as powerful antioxidants that fight against a wide variety of health conditions such as cancer and heart disease. They are also credited with causing reverse affects in the aging process, and enhancing athletic ability.

The question is, however, do these claims have substance - or is it a product of the giant corporate machine that preys on society’s fears, fuelled by the media. The media has a tendency to sensationalize certain ideas and findings, often misrepresenting them. This is one process by which consumer trends are created or molded.

If this is the case, the following question may be raised. Which food trends are inspired by factual information that is truly beneficial to health? In other words do certain products really deliver on promises made by industry or the media? If not, then who is to blame?

The media may be partly to blame for playing up on certain fears, facts or ideas. At the same time the corporations could be partly responsible as well. Where the real problem lies is in miscommunication. These problems would be solved if a reliable and effective stream of communication existed between the scientific community, the government, the media and the corporate world.

This is the objective these organizations should be striving for. Until such a system is put into place there will be no accurate way of telling whether the consumer can count on every benefit promised.

Now let’s get back to vitamin supplements. In order to find the facts we must go right to the source. In other words we have to look at results from scientific studies. A recent study, that included tens of thousands of subjects, showed that vitamin E and beta carotene supplementation did not lower the risk of heart disease or death from heart disease. Foods, however, that contain antioxidants are still recommended. (1)

Over the last twenty years there have been many similar studies with varying results. In fact they have been largely contradicting. And so to this day the subject remains controversial. If you look at the facts as a whole, you will find that vitamin supplements show no clear benefits in healthy people with well balanced diets.

On the other hand, in cases of malnutrition or other forms of vitamin deficiencies, vitamin supplementation subscribed by physicians has been proven to be beneficial and essential. Countless studies have proven that vitamins and nutrients from real food sources are much more effective.

In fact several key studies were done to determine why certain areas around the world had low incidents of heart disease and cancer. Evidence suggested that these low rates were attributed to diet. And in all these studies vitamin supplementation was virtually nonexistent. These areas of study have included the Mediterranean region, Japan, France, the Arctic, Africa and South America. It was found that these cultures contained diets with foods rich in natural antioxidants.

Some of these foods include fresh and cooked vegetables, wild greens, fruits, wine and variety of nuts. Compared to the American diet these diets contained higher contents of unrefined carbohydrates and/or higher fish contents and much lower quantities of red meat, hydrogenated fat and dairy products.

One reason why vitamin supplements have become so popular in North America is the type of lifestyle we lead. As a result of our busy, fast - paced way of life we find less and less time to prepare proper well balanced meals. Most of us, therefore, are not getting enough essential vitamins and nutrients from our diet. We are eating too much of the wrong foods and often feel tired and burned out.

Instead of improving our eating habits, we get sold on the pitch that we need vitamin supplements to increase strength and vitality. If we had well balanced diets in the first place, we wouldn’t have to throw away large sums of money on supplements, the vast majority of which are completely ineffective.

The wiser thing to do is try to incorporate some of these diet patterns that have been proven beneficial to health in the regions mentioned earlier. First of all we must increase fish intake and decrease consumption of red meat. Increase intakes of fruits, vegetables, whole unrefined carbohydrates and decrease amount of simple carbohydrates like sugar and products with white flour, saturated and hydrogenated fats - made from animal sources, margarines, creamy dressings and dips, and gravies. In other words, decrease the amount of processed food.

Furthermore, when combining a well balanced diet with regular exercise participation, the health benefits become tenfold. You will become more relaxed and able to sleep better. Your energy threshold will be increased, enabling you to perform at a higher level while feeling less tired. You will lose weight, your health and appearance will improve, and you’ll feel better about yourself.

References:

1 http://www.clevelandclinic.org, “Fighting heart disease: Should you be “pro” or “anti” antioxidants”, retrieved 29 Oct. 2004 from http://www.clevelandclinic.org/heartcenter/pub/guide/disease/cad/vitamin_e.htm

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What are vitamins? The term ‘vitamin’ was first given to a group of substances that were thought to be vital for life, each containing a nitrogen-containing component known as an amine. Vitamins are essential for the proper functioning of our body. They help to strengthen the immune system, to ward off disease, and even to improve the overall mood of a person. If a particular vitamin is missing from your diet, it may lead to a deficiency disease.

Vitamins can help prevent diseases mainly in two ways. First, they prevent the deficiency syndromes characteristic of the respective vitamin. Second, they increase the health benefits of the specific vitamin.

Vitamins mainly belong to two categories - fat-soluble and water-soluble. Fat-soluble vitamins are those that can be stored in the body fat and hence need not be replenished daily. Water soluble vitamins cannot be stored in the body and need to be taken daily.

The debate has always been whether you need vitamin supplements to meet the body’s daily needs or whether you can get it from a balanced diet. Theoretically, you do not need vitamin supplements. However, in reality, you cannot get enough of the vitamins that the body needs from your diet. Blame it on pollution, blame it on declining soil quality due to intensive agricultural practices, blame it on your eating habits, it’s getting more and more difficult to get your daily dose of vitamins from your food.

Taking vitamin supplements are, therefore, unavoidable. You need to take them regularly if you need to get all the vitamins into the body. Trying to compromise on that could lead to the breakdown of your immune system, and deficiency diseases.

But there are plenty of vitamin supplements out there. How do you choose the best one? For one, you cannot hope to take a vitamin pill and end the story. Because your body needs multivitamins, and pills containing all of them in the required quantities will be real big pills. They will be a pain to carry and eat regularly, to say the least. Again multivitamin supplements should have the correct mix. If you end up taking too much of one vitamin, that again is can cause health problems.

Talking of multivitamin supplements, one cannot ignore glyconutrients, a recent discovery. Glyconutrients are the plant carbohydrates. Though there are more than 200 of these, eight of them are most essential for our body. These eight essential sugars are responsible for some of the most fundamental biochemical processes in the body. Glyconutrients help in cell-to-cell communication. When the 600 trillion cells in your body talk well, they build well too. That means the body’s systems and processes stay fighting fit!

What are the benefits of glyconutrients? Glyconutrients are known for their anti-aging properties. They help athletes in improving their performance and to reduce the recovery time in case of injury. Glyconutrients have also produced positive effects in children suffering from ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) and ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder).

Whether you are suffering from a medical condition or not, glyconutrients are essential for your body. They help your body heal, repair, regenerate, regulate and protect itself.

So when you select your multivitamin supplement, make sure it contains glyconutrients. They are absolutely necessary for maintaining optimum wellness of the body.

Lisa Hyde-Barrett, a registered nurse and wellness advocate, understands the relationship between good nutrition and good health. She’s become passionate about the new research behind sugars, specifically glyconutritional products.
Know more about multivitamin supplements with glyconutrients at http://www.deadly-health-myths.com/best_vitamins.html