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In 2020, the global dietary supplements market size was valued at USD $140.3 billion. More than ever before, people of all ages are struggling to fulfill their daily nutrient requirements owing to hectic work schedules, chronic stress and changing lifestyles. Millions of people take multivitamins every day and still wind up having inadequate intake of essential micronutrients and vitamin deficiencies that impact their health. This year alone, we've learned that Vitamin D plays a critical role in cellular function and immune health. But there are many more nutrients that are equally important to support a robust immune system response and our individual metabolic needs.
In Part Two of De-Myth-tifying Multivitamins we'll continue to unpack the smart way to optimize your nutrition, giving you what you need to know BEFORE you rush out to buy another multivitamin or supplement and the tools you need in order to build a better multivitamin that meets all of your metabolism, detoxification and cellular energy needs.
Building a better multivitamin step by step.
1. Clarify your own nutritional needs with an annual physical and thorough nutritional assessment. Consider partnering with a practitioner who specializes in functional medicine and functional nutrition or a registered dietician who has advanced education and training in functional nutrition. Check out the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics: https://www.eatright.org/find-a-nutrition-expert
2. Find out why advanced nutritional testing for oxidative stress, malabsorption markers, essential amino acids and metabolic fatty acid markers is so important in order to get to the root cause of symptoms. Check out my website on this: https://sevahealthgroup.com/specialized-lab-testing/
3. Don't get hooked with online tests that give you results but don't provide contextual analysis based upon your individual health needs and your lifestyle. Good professional advice doesn't cost you. It pays you.
4. Talk to your functional medicine or functional nutrition specialist about optimal form requirements for each nutrient. For example, folate formally referred to as folacin is found naturally in foods as folate. Folic acid is the manmade version sold as supplements and added to fortified foods. Folate is a B-vitamin that is absolutely critical for cell growth and metabolism and it’s very important for pregnant women and women in childbearing age because it reduces the risk of brain and spine defects in a baby’s brain. Folate is deficiencies are also common in people who have digestive issues, kidney or liver disease or those who abuse alcohol. Folate needs to be converted by the body into its metabolically active form which is 5-methyltetrahydrofolate or 5-MTHF. If folate is not converted into 5-MTHF form, it’s not metabolically active. There are enzymes in the body that control this conversion. Synthetic folic acid is converted into dihydrofolate which is then converted into tetrahydrofolate, which is converted into 10-Formyl-THF, which is then converted into 5,10 Methenyl-THF, which is then converted into 5,10 Methylene THF which is finally converted into 5-MTHF. The reason this is important is because roughly 35-40% of people have a gene variant or single nucleotide polymorphism that interferes with or impairs their ability to convert folate into its active form. Individuals with this gene variant would require a multivitamin with the metabolically active form of folate 5-MTHF. Research has shown that 5-MTHF has been shown in studies to be almost 7 times more biologically active than folic acid. Check out this resource: https://www.designsforhealth.com/binaries/content/assets/designs-for-health/library/patient-education/l-5-mthf-pl-patiented.pdf
4. Next you want to be looking at potency. Remember that the labels you’re reading on supplement bottles and products sold in the US are based upon Recommended Daily Allowances and average requirements as established by the United States federal government and these standards were set many, many years ago.
These averages do not take into account the underlying health issues that may make your nutrient requirements higher. For example, people with heart disease, high cholesterol, diabetes have different nutrient requirements for optimal health, cellular metabolism and keeping those conditions under control. Older adults and elderly absolutely have different nutrient requirements. Those who take certain medications may need higher potency (we talked about that in Episode 1). So you want to be tuned into potency.
5. Finally you want to consider additional nutrients that aren’t commonly found in basic multivitamins such as: boron, mixed vitamin E tocopherols, alpha lipoic acid, bioflavanoids and carotenoids like lycopene.
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