Kent Sport health and fitness instructor Sarah Black tackles the supplement industry and helps us navigate the options.
If you spend money on a daily multi-vitamin and your cupboards have bottles of minerals, vitamins and health pills promised to optimise your wellbeing… Then I urge you to read my article.
There is so much choice on the market when it comes to choosing multi vitamins and supplements. A lot of literature recommending the amounts you need to be taking and then there are different brands which makes decisions inevitably hard.
We spend hundreds of pounds on tablets that we trust are benefiting our health. Yet how many of us actually know what ingredients are in our tablets and if the amount we are taking is adequate for us as an individual? Did you know that the majority of calcium tablets are in the carbonate form? This is because it is the cheapest most abundant ingredient for production and it is the most popular form sold on the market. The body struggles to absorb carbonate and only around 3% is absorbed in the body and can be utilised. Your daily supplement just became a darn waste of time didn’t it? Why do the supermarkets sell them then? It’s called business. Why do doctors prescribe them? It’s cost effective. When we go to the doctor we expect to go away with something that will be the answer and trick to fix our health problem. If the doctor prescribed you nothing and offered you a hug as the solution, you’d feel rather hard done by wouldn’t you? Offering you a supplement is a cost effective placebo. Offering it in the standard recommended amounts is the doctors duty to avoid any professional risk. Even though 85% of the population is deficient in Vitamin D, due to its harmful risks in over dosing, the doctors will always recommend the Institute of Medicines recommended dietary allowance to avoid any consequences.
I am busy telling you what problems we are faced with and the ugly truth. So, what measures should we take to avoid wasting money and time on supplements?
Take my advice with a pinch of salt. As you need to recognise, there are so many different opinions, research and advice available for the public; that my advice is just another article. You need to do your own research, seek professional care and advice for specific requirements and always check the label! Ensure that any current prescribed medicines have no contra indicatory effect on taking supplements. Ensure you take the correct amount, which is suited to your specific requirements.
I will focus on Calcium, Magnesium and Vitamin D3 and K2. I feel these are crucially important for all of us. Bone health is the silent killer until it strikes, or in this instance breaks!
It gets very complex as they recommend milk, dairy, cheese etc for gaining calcium from the diet. Yet a product like cheddar cheese is so acidic it actually causes more calcium to be leeched from the bones to neutralise the blood that the calcium we absorb. The way foods are digested and broken down are more complex to explain in this article. Eating spinach within plus or minus two hours of taking calcium negates the absorption process. I have no simple means to the solutions, as this is as confusing for me as it is for you!
Calcium in the citrate form is easily absorbed and utilised in the body. Aiding our bones and teeth, hair, nails and skin. 1000-1200mg per day would be helpful. Foods such as dairy, broccoli, spinach, tofu, nuts, sardines with bones, fish and green leafy vegetables.
Then you need these vitamins and minerals to aid the absorption of calcium.
Magnesium in the glycinate form is the best type of supplement to ingest, due to its absorbable contents. Its calming effect has been widely rated and the success for combating chronic pain and muscle toxicity. Citrate or malate is the next best choice. Malate has had success lowering the painful effects of patients suffering Fibromyalgia. Take magnesium at breakfast along side your D3. Taking 200mg is adequate to boost your levels of this mineral, but 400mg is recommend as high doses of D3 depletes the bodies magnesium. Taking 100mg with each meal would be a good game plan, spreading the doses throughout the day. Foods – dark green leafy vegetables, herring, mackerel, potato, nuts, seeds, blackberries and bananas.
Vitamin D3 – in the Cholecalciferol form. A soft gel capsule with a meal that includes dietary fat is the best way to absorb this vitamin. 4000-8000 IUs (international units) for adults. Foods – liver, cheese, beef liver, fish like herring and mackerel, egg yolks.
Vitamin K2 (MK-7 form) – 90-100mcg (micrograms) daily. Best taken at dinner time with foods including dietary fat. Caution – if you are taking blood thinning medicines such as Warfarin and Coumadin do not take Vitamin K! Foods – green leafy vegetables, Chards, broccoli, cabbage, kale. K2 is used alongside D3 to deposit calcium in the bones and teeth where it is required, instead of clogging the muscles and arteries.
This is why you need to check with your doctor what would be best for you. Remember vitamins A,D,E and K are fat soluble which is why eating dietary fat at the same time would aid the digestion and absorption.
I reiterate the need to research yourself the recommendations individually. I have written this article to alert your interest to check the label if you are taking a supplement and multi-vitamin. Most of us are? I urge you to stop wasting time and money on the wrong thing. Wise up to what works, what does not. If you really care for your health, request a bood test to measure the amounts of minerals in your body. For example a Vitamin D 25- Hydroxy test to find out if you are lacking in this all important mineral.
If you want to know the health and state of your bones. Request a DEXA scan and see the condition of your Bone Mass Density. If you care about your current future health take all necessary precautions to avoid later life fractures and osteoporosis which effect as many as 1 in 3 woman and 1 in 5 men. Look after your health and be sure to buy the right supplements if you are going to go to all the efforts of ingesting them. Do not waste your time and money and risk your health by taking the wrong ones, in the wrong amounts.
Or take this advice. …Eat a healthy, hearty diet, filled with fruit and vegetables and an array of vital nutrients. Eat in colours. Exercise and expend energy to maximise your wellbeing with increasing your cardiovascular abilities. Drink lots of water. Avoid high levels of salt and carbonated drinks. Avoid alcohol and don’t smoke and eat high saturated fatty foods. Eat organic, fresh, homemade meals that don’t come out of a processed packet.
Above all; enjoy your life.
For assistance with your nutrition, wellbeing and exercise, book a consultation with Kent Sport fitness team.