Dietitian

Dietitian: Don’t waste money on multivitamins, even if your diet isn’t super healthy

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About half of U.S. adults take a daily multivitamin. If you find that you’re one of them, it might be time to reconsider the old habit. There is solid evidence to support that they are largely useless, so most of the hype is just really good marketing and public relations. As a dietitian, I’ll explain why multivitamins are not a top choice for most people.

Most people see the word “multi” in multivitamin and just assume that the supplement has everything they need without knowing what it actually provides. The reality is that there is no clear-cut way to define a multivitamin, as nutrient amounts vary depending on the product.

They can come in the form of pills, gummies, powders, and even liquids. Most products say take one per multivitamin day, but always read the label for your specific brand. Generally speaking, multivitamins provide most of the essential vitamins and minerals we need on a daily basis. However, people could obtain these nutrients through food.

While some small studies have shown that multivitamins can provide certain boosts, such as improvements in memory, an overwhelming majority of research suggests that they hardly do anything at all. A recent review from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) analyzed research from 84 studies and almost 700,000 people and found that the supplements had little to no benefit for the prevention of major illnesses like cancer and heart disease. In other words, a multivitamin isn’t likely to make or break your health, and it might be better to just save your money.

Vitamins and supplements

Who might need multivitamins?

There are always exceptions, and some people do need multivitamins, so working with your doctor and dietitian can help better assess your specific needs. For example, some people with gastrointestinal conditions like Crohn’s Disease may need additional vitamin supplementation because of poor nutrient absorption by their bodies.

Similarly, gastric bypass surgery patients often take multivitamins for the rest of their lives due to impaired absorption. If you are on a diet that restricts several food groups for a medical reason, you may also receive a recommendation to take nutritional supplements.

Yellow supplements in a person's hand
(Photo by Alexander Grey on Unsplash)

Not only does research show that multivitamins provide barely any benefit for the average person, but it also shows that they could be harmful in some cases. There are two groups of vitamins: water and fat soluble.

Water soluble vitamins get excreted out of your body through urine when there is too much available in the body. However, fat soluble vitamins don’t leave the body as easily and can instead accumulate and potentially cause harm.

Vitamin A is an example of a fat-soluble vitamin that most health experts recommend consuming only through food because of the risks for toxicity. If you eat a varied and balanced diet and also take a multivitamin, you may be getting more of different nutrients than you actually need.

Depending on which nutrients they are, you either excrete the excess in your urine, risk harmful accumulation, or don’t reap any benefits at all. As a dietitian, my general guidance is always to optimize your food intake first before resorting to any sort of supplementation.

Bottom Line

Although it might feel like you’re doing the healthy thing, multivitamins are not the ticket to a clean bill of health. If you are concerned that you have nutrient deficiencies, it’s best to get tested and then supplement exactly what you need.

Multivitamins often just jam a bunch of nutrients that you don’t really need, even if you only eat a semi-healthy diet. Relying on these supplements in order to excuse an unhealthy diet is also not the best idea. One of the most efficient ways to ensure you keep your vitamin and mineral supply up is to eat a versatile diet that you can sustain long-term.

Why You Should Eat Breakfast and the Best Times for the Rest of the Day’s Meals.

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Keeping track of what you’re supposed to eat to stay healthy can already be overwhelming, but it turns out that when you eat what can also be important for keeping your weight in control and for warding off chronic disease.

It turns out Mom was right: you should eat breakfast. And if you don’t believe Mom, a growing body of studies shows that a good meal in the morning can help your body prepare for the day to come, and lower your risk of heart disease, diabetesand obesity. But what about the rest of the day’s meals? Here’s what nutrition experts say about the best times to eat and why.

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Morning
Don’t skip breakfast. Reporting in the American Heart Association journal Circulation, Harvard School of Public Health researchers studied the health outcomes of 26,902 male health professionals ages 45 to 82 over a 16-year period. They discovered that the men who skipped breakfast had a 27% higher risk of heart attack or death from heart disease than those who honored the morning meal. According to the scientists, skipping breakfast may make you hungrier and more likely to eat larger meals, which leads to a surge in blood sugar. Such spikes can pave the way for diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol levels, all risk factors that can snowball into a heart attack.

Pass on the pastry. Eating in the morning — and what you eat — is important for setting your blood-sugar pattern for the rest of the day. “If you eat something that is whole grain and has some fat and protein to it, your blood sugar is going to rise slowly and go down slowly. If you eat something refined, like an overly sweet cinnamon roll, that’s the worst thing you can eat,” says Judy Caplan, a registered dietitian nutritionist for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. “You get an insulin [spike], and [then] your blood sugar drops too low so you get hungry again. That’s why people get into a cycle of overeating junk.”

To ease your body into a more consistent blood-sugar pattern, try some oatmeal, whole-wheat toast with almond butter, or an omelette with spinach and avocado. Caplan’s favorite breakfast is a baked sweet potato with a little bit of cinnamon and a small bit of butter. Who says you have to eat just cereal in the morning?

Afternoon
Fuel up at the right time. In the 1960s, nutritionist Adelle Davis popularized the mantra “Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a pauper.” Why? Fueling up makes sense earlier in the day, when your body needs the most calories for energy. That’s why in many European countries, the largest meal of the day occurs in the afternoon. “Ideally, you want to give yourself fuel before you do harder labor,” says Caplan.

If you’re used to eating a smaller meal for lunch and a larger meal later, you can still fill up with a hearty meal that has significantly fewer calories. “A fairly large meal [that] is full of salad and vegetables [is] big in volume but light in calories,” says Caplan.

Evening
Don’t overdo it. Calories get burned up no matter when you eat them, so theoretically it’s O.K. to eat after dark. But if you eat a heavy dinner, you’re not as likely to get rid of those calories before you turn in. “What you don’t burn off is more likely to be stored as fat, as you become less active toward the end of the day,” says Tracy Lockwood, a registered dietitian at F-Factor Nutrition. “Eating too close to bedtime increases your blood sugar and insulin, which causes you to have a hard time falling asleep. Therefore, your last meal should be the lightest of the day and should be eaten at least three hours before you go to sleep.”

There’s another reason that late-night eating, after dinner, isn’t a good idea. In most cases, those visits to the fridge involve sweet treats such as ice cream and other desserts that can send blood sugar soaring right before bed. That can lower levels of the hormone melatonin, which is supposed to help you feel tired and relaxed, so waning levels can make it harder to fall asleep. “A boost of energy coming from your dinner, which may have consisted of pasta, rice or bread, can act as a short-lived stimulant, causing you to feel more awake immediately after a meal,” says Lockwood. “Also, it is not recommended to lie down immediately after a meal, especially a big one, since it increases your chance for acid reflux.”

Keep it light. “If you go to Europe and places where there is not as much obesity as the rest of the world, people eat very late and they’re not necessarily overweight. That’s because they are walking everywhere and they are typically not eating a huge and heavy meal,” says Caplan. “Instead, it may be avocado and toast with a side of soup.”

Source: http://healthland.time.com