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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Study raises alert on Vitamin E

Los Angeles Times

High doses of vitamin E, often viewed as a panacea for cancer, heart disease and other illnesses, actually increase the risk of death slightly among the elderly and infirm, researchers said.

The study found that the increased risk of death was small, only about 5 percent for those who had taken larger doses of the vitamin for at least five years. But vitamin E is taken by so many people – an estimated one-quarter of the American population – that even a small increase is significant, the researchers said Wednesday.

“People take vitamins because they believe it will benefit their health in the long term and prolong life,” said Dr. Edgar R. Miller III of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, a co-author of the study. “But our study shows that use of high-dose vitamin E supplements certainly did not prolong life, but was associated with a higher risk of death.”

Miller presented the results Wednesday at a New Orleans meeting of the American Heart Association, and they were published online in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

“Too often, in terms of the supplements, there’s very scant science,” Dr. Raymond Gibbons of the Mayo Clinic told a news conference at the heart meeting. “In this area, we have the science. Vitamin E doesn’t work.”

But some scientists were skeptical of the results. Dr. David Heber, director of the University of California, Los Angeles’ Center for Human Nutrition, said there is “a disconnect” between large studies like this one and smaller studies that have shown a benefit from taking vitamin E.

Many of the people in the studies “were older people and had pre-existing diseases. It’s hard to ascribe the bad outcomes to vitamin E, per se,” he said.

The new results came from a so-called meta-analysis that combined data on 135,967 patients in 19 separate studies. The combined results indicated an increased risk for patients – most of whom were over the age of 60 and suffering from heart disease or other illnesses – who took more than 400 international units of vitamin E per day.

The results do not say anything about the effects of high doses in older people who are healthy or the effects in younger people. The study found no increased risk at doses below 200 IU, and possibly a slight benefit.

The typical vitamin E supplement contains 400 IU, although some contain as much as 1,000. Multivitamin supplements typically contain 30 to 60 IU.

Most people get about 6 to 10 IU of vitamin E per day from their diet, typically from vegetable oils, green leafy vegetables, and seeds, nuts and corn.

Nutritional guidelines currently do not recommend vitamin E supplements and suggest a maximum daily dose of 1,500 IU.

Many cardiologists, as well as the American Heart Association, already recommend that patients not take vitamin E because previous studies have shown that the supplements are not beneficial. The new findings seem likely to increase the urgency of such warnings.

Vitamin E manufacturers and proponents scoffed at the new findings.

John Hathcock, vice president of scientific affairs for the Council for Responsible Nutrition, a supplement industry group, said the increased risk found by the study was “driven by the results from just a few of these clinical trials, some of which are suspect and/or outdated.”