What are these vitamins good for?!
Question: My Grandmother takes a Multi Vitamin for Seniors that has Luden and Lycopene and extra Calcium with vitamin D . She also takes extra Vitiamin E & Folic Acid by advice of her Dr., She also takes Clucosamine Chondrotin she says for her joints and cartilage because she has arthritis very bad. She also takes Melatonin 5mg & Valerian Root extract 1000mg. She says she can sleep with these two. I am just worried that she may be taking to many vitamins.
Answers: My Grandmother takes a Multi Vitamin for Seniors that has Luden and Lycopene and extra Calcium with vitamin D . She also takes extra Vitiamin E & Folic Acid by advice of her Dr., She also takes Clucosamine Chondrotin she says for her joints and cartilage because she has arthritis very bad. She also takes Melatonin 5mg & Valerian Root extract 1000mg. She says she can sleep with these two. I am just worried that she may be taking to many vitamins.
sounds fine to me. When you get up in years you need more vitamins because your body doesn't absorb them as easily.
Lutein and Lycopene are good for eye sight
D is good for bones and calcium absorbtion
E and folic acid are good for various things
Clucosamine Chondrotin is good for joints, cartilege & arthritis
Melatonin & Valerian Root extract do help most people fall asleep
She might want to add magnesium at bedtime too.
No, that's not too many vitamins by any means. We have hundreds of customers that take more than 50 pills a day, and I've talked to a few customers that take 60-80 products a day.... she actually uses a pretty small number of pills compared to any "regular supplement user".
Lycopene is an antioxidant that's commonly used for Prostate health... but you many people use it for the antioxidant support, which helps for skin, eyes, immune system, etc. Lutein is also a good antioxidant and it provides a lot of benefits for eye health. Calcium and Vitamin D is good for bone health (which is very important in older people), just make sure she's not getting much over 1200 mg of Calcium daily.
If her doctor has recommended extra Vitamin E and Folic Acid above her multi, I would suggest she stick with that (after all, her doctor ran the tests to see that she needed it). Glucosamine and Chondroitin are very good supplements for joint health (many people with arthritis try these). Melatonin and Valerian are very safe and natural products that help to balance out Serotonin, which is the hormone that controls the sleeping and waking cycles.
All in all, she's taking a perfectly safe combination and she is perfectly safe taking that many pills and more. Supplements don't have the side effects like drugs have, so it's typically not a problem to take multiple supplements.
[edit] In regards to DAVE B, don't let that worry you. Readers Digest just re-addressed several anti-vitamin articles that have been written over the past couple years, most of which were based on faulty results from studies that were done. The one I think is the funniest is the one that RD implies that vitamin E increases mortality rate.... but the study involved giving vitamin E to terminal patients to see if it would help (the vitamin E didn't cure any of the terminal illnesses... which it's not supposed to).
Most all doctors still recommend for people to take a general multivitamin, even with those faulty studies that were done.
Read the new issue of Readers Digest. It tells you 10 vitamins to avoid,taking over dose of,and C& E are some. Check it out!
She is not taking too many vitamins. Each one she is taking is for a specific reason. It sounds like she is very much on the ball where her health is concerned.
No, those supplements are fine.
I take quite a few supplements and my health is good.
My Dad took much more than this! Sounds like your Grandma is taking good care of herself.
the dosage isn't very high in over the counter vitamins, so don't worry too much....grandmom sounds pretty health conscious