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Evaluating Your Multivitamin Supplement
Sat, 08/21/2010 - 10:00pm
The importance of a well-balanced diet high in fruits and vegetables is basic for good health, and we all know that we should be including at least five daily servings of each. However, even when we take care in eating the most nutritious locally grown, organic foods, research has shown that today's diet is insufficient to avoid many chronic degenerative diseases. (JAMA, June 19, 2002) The nutrient-deficient soils of today just do not provide us with the quality nutrition we need in order to maintain optimal health. The simple fact of the matter is, if the nutrients are not in the soil and not in our foods, then they’re not in our bodies.
More and more of us are now taking dietary supplements to improve our health. How can we determine which products will be effective, safe, and contain a proper balance of nutrients? Fortunately, there are experts that help make the choice easier. Here at the Lumigrate products link, you will find the Comparative Guide to Nutritional Supplements by Lyle MacWilliam MSc, FP. This compendium not only discusses the prevention of degenerative diseases through supplementation, the important safety features to watch out for when taking supplements, but also rates over 1500 products available in the United States and Canada. You can find out more specific information at www.comparativeguide.com.
In the meantime, here is a quick checklist to help you evaluate whether a product is worthy of your consideration:
1) Is the product delivered in a single dose? (a once-a-day tablet simply cannot provide the levels of potency needed for optimal nutrition without being too large to swallow)
2) Are the potency levels of the ingredients high enough to provide optimal daily nutritional intake without compromising safety?
3) Are the ingredients provided in the most bioavailable form? (mineral salts are not as well absorbed as chelated minerals or minerals bound to an organic carrier)
4) Is the safety profile of each ingredient thoroughly researched and evaluated?
5) Is the product formulated to meet USP standards for full disintegration and dissolution?
6) Does the company meet United States and Canadian pharmaceutical guidelines (USP) for Good Manufacturing Processes (GMPs)?
7) Is product potency guaranteed for a specified shelf life?
8) Is the product independently tested and guaranteed for potency and safety?
9) Is the product manufactured in-house or contracted out to the lowest bidder?
10) Is the product free of ingredients that have cummulative toxicities (i.e. preformed vitamin A and iron)? Products that are free from iron and deliver their vit A with beta-carotene are preferable.
If your product meets all these criteria, you know you have a supplement of exceptional quality. If it doesn't, keep looking. For more information, go to www.comparativeguide.com
__________________
Robin started contributing to Lumigrate in August 2010. "Meet Robin Thomas", a topic in our biographies/vitae forum is at http://www.lumigrate.com/forum/meet-robin-thomas to read all about her journey, which was greatly influenced by the need to help solve her youngest son's significant health challenges. For those who want just the overview here: After working over 22 years in medical research at the University of North Carolina on chronic inflammatory diseases she switched her focus to preventive health in 2004 when she was introduced to USANA Health Sciences. Robin is passionate about helping others improve their health, have more energy, manage their weight, and improve their skin.
I love meeting new friends !
LIKE me on Facebook Connect on LinkedIn
Follow me on Twitter Learn more at my BLOG
"I dream of a world free from pain and suffering. I dream of a world free from disease. The USANA family will be the healthiest family on earth. Share my vision. Love life and live it to its fullest in happiness and health."
-Dr. Myron Wentz, Founder and Chairman, USANA Health Sciences
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e-mailThis forum is provided to allow members of Lumigrate to share information and ideas. Any recommendations made by forum members regarding medical treatments, medications, or procedures are not endorsed by Lumigrate or practitioners who serve as Lumigrate's medical experts.
I really appreciate your taking the time to come and help educate people about this invaluable topic -- supplements. To provide a website for 'comparativeguide' is really helpful, and I really appreciate the perspective you have about Lumigrate's intentions and ability to educate people about progressive topics in a valid way, and make it streamlined (as your piece is) and then we look overall to have FUN here at Lumigrate too!
I thought I'd wrap a litte of my personal history related to yours, Robin -- when your husband was working in the 1980s on a project for EPA that ended up coming up and out with 'sick building syndrome' I was working in a new, cheaply built state building which had a lot of outgassing and combined with long hours, my health gave out. So I feel a connection to your work (collectively, you and your husband being a team) in that regard. And as I have said to you personally and in my Your Story About Your Fibromyalgia here in the forums at Lumigrate, I have thyroid and adrenal issues and have been diagnosed in the past through heavy metals challenge testing as being way high on mercury, lead and cadmium. I have done some progressive treatments, about 50% of what was recommended overall, and saw my symptoms improve a great deal, AND I think I've learned a lot about supplements in the years since filming 'Supplements and Disease Prevention' that you see on Lumigrate.com on the videos tab. I think it's a wonderful tool for patients who would like some help from their medical provider to direct them to learn from, as Dr Rollins' seminar is probably a good watch for someone even like yourself, who is very knowledgeable about supplements... a little difficult to absorb for the average consumer unless they study it (and they are watchable unlimited #s of times once a person or persons go in together and purchase and download). Yes, the 'absorb' was a pun ... to be fun. Thanks for the validity, progressive and making it streamlined too with the link out for more info at a relevant, valid website.
~~ Mardy
Live and Learn. Learn and Live Better! is my motto. I'm Mardy Ross, and I founded Lumigrate in 2008 after a career as an occupational therapist with a background in health education and environmental research program administration. Today I function as the desk clerk for short questions people have, as well as 'concierge' services offered for those who want a thorough exploration of their health history and direction to resources likely to progress their health according to their goals. Contact Us comes to me, so please do if you have questions or comments. Lumigrate is "Lighting the Path to Health and Well-Being" for increasing numbers of people. Follow us on social networking sites such as: Twitter: http://twitter.com/lumigrate and Facebook. (There is my personal page and several Lumigrate pages. For those interested in "groovy" local education and networking for those uniquely talented LumiGRATE experts located in my own back yard, "LumiGRATE Groove of the Grand Valley" is a Facebook page to join. (Many who have joined are beyond our area but like to see the Groovy information! We not only have FUN, we are learning about other providers we can be referring patients to and 'wearing a groove' to each other's doors -- or websites/home offices!) By covering some of the things we do, including case examples, it reinforces the concepts at Lumigrate.com as well as making YOU feel that you're part of a community. Which you ARE at Lumigrate!
Robin, You have posted significant standards information that needs to be considered by anyone taking vitamins and supplements. After all it is a $23 Billion dollar industry almost all of which would not meet the standards you have so rightly posted. You might want to add the Austrian Pharmaceutical Standards which are the toughest in the world.
Roughly 95% of all vitamins and supplements are now manufactured in China. The only requirement is that the product lists who distributes the product.
It is my understanding that an FDA panel will soon be insisting that every supplement will have to have primary studies published that prove the efficacy of their product. By primary I mean a clinical study on actual people taking the actual product as it is packaged for sale. Those studies will need to be randomized, double blind and placebo controlled to be counted.
What have you heard about this?
You might want to take a look at the standards highlighted at www.tkociembajuiceplus.com. Click on the tab "Research" and scroll down to "Research Shows". Any product that can do that deserves serious consideration.
Love to have a conversation with you!
Mardy's Note: 12/8/11: The distributor who provided this content on Lumigrate at my encouragement and with my support in the past has messaged through Lumigrate to request the content he provided be removed as he doesn't wish to participate in this 'effort' anymore. The forums at Lumigrate are a social media format, similar to facebook. That would be like contacting facebook and saying "take everything I ever commented on or posted off". Many conversations and exchanges of other providers are woven in 'threads' and that would be disrespectful to the other forum participants who gave their time and energy to participate in the 'social' media of Lumigrate's forums. However, I have changed the UserName to be Juice Plus 007, removed the photo, and am posting this in the signature and removing the contact information that is set up in the signature in order to make it clear this contributor no longer wants to be 'connected' with the posts. Additionally, as time permits, I will work to replace the content with similar but that will entail selecting another person distributing for Juice Plus. I wanted JP represented on Lumigrate because it is a well-known company based on the concept of supplementing fruits and vegetables. Also because JP reaches many people due to it's vast number of distributors; there are 10 in Grand Junction, population 50k or so. In addition to removing the information in the signature for contact, I have changed the username and email address associated with it to route to me if anyone were to send a "private message" to JP007. My first step will be to edit out any internal contact information/links to the requestor. I guess you call this an "imposter"? Grins! I hope this is a clear statement for the users of Lumigrate to view related YOUR forum area and how I manage it. After all, it is YOUR health education (and mine) I'm advocating for but Lumigrate, at the end of the day, is my website. I care a great deal about the users of Lumigrate feeling they are being treated well and providing a forum area which is a FUN place to come get valid, progressive information in a streamlined way when searching for health information our audience of consumers is seeking.
It's been a while since I wrote the original article here. This topic has been in the news a lot lately, so I updated with more thorough information on certifications and independent studies that will be so helpful when making a decision on choosing a multi-vitamin supplement. You can find the link with the newest information on Lumigrate here:
http://www.lumigrate.com/forum/how-do-you-know-your-supplements-are-safe-and-effective
Live Well,
Robin
Robin started contributing to Lumigrate in August 2010. "Meet Robin Thomas", a topic in our biographies/vitae forum is at http://www.lumigrate.com/forum/meet-robin-thomas to read all about her journey, which was greatly influenced by the need to help solve her youngest son's significant health challenges. For those who want just the overview here: After working over 22 years in medical research at the University of North Carolina on chronic inflammatory diseases she switched her focus to preventive health in 2004 when she was introduced to USANA Health Sciences. Robin is passionate about helping others improve their health, have more energy, manage their weight, and improve their skin.
I love meeting new friends !
LIKE me on Facebook Connect on LinkedIn
Follow me on Twitter Learn more at my BLOG
"I dream of a world free from pain and suffering. I dream of a world free from disease. The USANA family will be the healthiest family on earth. Share my vision. Love life and live it to its fullest in happiness and health."
-Dr. Myron Wentz, Founder and Chairman, USANA Health Sciences