Vitamin E Supplements: Can It Be Risky to Your Health?
Vitamin E has been made known to bring many health benefits to human body. But according to Dr. John Swartzberg, chairman of the editorial board of the UC Berkeley Wellness Letter, supplements of vitamin E can be risky for certain people's health.
According to The Science Times, Dr. Swartzberg, who is an internist specialized in infectious disease, published an article in "Live Science's Expert Voice" divulging his opinion on vitamin E supplements. He found out that early researches with results showing Vitamin E being highly beneficial to the body can contain some discrepancies.
While these studies did find a benefit, especially for heart disease, these studies were not always well designed and were mostly observational and not clinical trials.
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Studies with structured scientific methodology base and well-designed clinic trials were performed and it revealed that there is no benefit in taking vitamin E supplements. There are even several studies that suggest that high doses of vitamin E could actually be harmful to human health. One of the studies included was made in 2008 wherein it discovered that vitamin E slightly increased the risk of hemorrhagic strokes
In an article released by NBC News, it stated that according to a study, daily dose of vitamin E could actually heighten a man's risk of prostate cancer. Researchers found out the disturbing link while studying the effects of antioxidants on men's health. The vitamin E study called the SELECT trial started in 2001.
The researchers were trying to prove vitamin E and selenium to reduce risk of prostate cancer. What they found out surprised them as the results showed the opposite, with risk of prostate cancer increased by 17 percent.
More recent studies have also revealed that vitamin E supplements are associated with increased mortality. Dr. Swatzber ended his article by encouraging people to discuss vitamin E supplements with their doctor as there are still benefits to the known antioxidant. There are some studies that showed vitamin E helpful in liver damage caused by inflammation from aggressive nonalcoholic fatty liver disease linked with obesity.
