Buy the best: when it comes to vitamins, quality beats quantity

Better Nutrition, July, 2003 by Michael Downey

Let's face it: You dish out good money for your multivitamins because you want the health benefits of specific, active nutrients--vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, herbal extracts. But what about the inactive ingredients listed on the label?

Even the highest-quality vitamin pills contain inactive components. After all, vitamins don't grow on trees. Well, actually they do: They're called fruits. But when you eliminate the fiber, antioxidants and water, you're left with powdered chemicals that can be pressed into tablets or poured into capsules.

Without certain "non-nutritive" ingredients--or excipients--these tablets could crumble to powder instead of staying in pill form. And that's just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the world of vitamin additives.

chemistry set

Some additives allow a timed release; others make pills smoother so they don't stick to your throat. Binders--with names such as polyethylene glycol--hold the tablet together. Fatty acids or stearates are added as lubricants to assist manufacturing. If you see sodium lauryl sulfate on the label, don't panic; such disintegrators ensure the pill dissolves in the body. Some supplements contain minute amounts of ground sand--or silica--to keep moisture from causing clumping inside the capsule. And chlorophyll, fructose or other flavoring agents disguise what would otherwise be, well, a bitter pill to swallow.

You may also see benzoic acid listed on your supplement label. That might sound scary, but it's actually just rosemary extract used as an antioxidant and preservative. Titanium dioxide? It's a whitening agent. As for talc, don't worry. It's not the impure stuff you find in face powder. It's hydrous magnesium silicate, used for dusting tablet molds. It's even a source of dietary magnesium and silicon.

The need for coloring is questionable. But consumers don't like it when their vitamins vary in color from one pill to the next--or when they're a sickly gray.

Some vitamins do contain fillers. Correctly called diluents, they round out the supplement. They're harmless, usually traces of rice or tapioca powder, starch or sodium chloride--salt.

If you're really concerned about ingesting microscopic amounts of harmless excipients along with your vitamins and minerals, you can reduce your intake of those additives slightly by opting for brands labeled "free of sugars, salt, artificial colors, preservatives and lactose." This is extremely important if you're lactose-intolerant or have a food additive allergy.

And vegetarians should be aware that gelatin capsules and some excipients derive from animal sources. So if you want to completely avoid animal products, look for "vegi-caps" or some other notation that a supplement is totally plant-based.

The simple truth, however, is that if you do find an entirely additive-free supplement, there's only one thing you're likely to gain: a higher price.

nutrients and nonsense

So how can you tell if your vitamins are high-quality?

Forget the inactive additives. Focus on the active nutrients.

Make sure your multivitamin offers all the major vitamins and minerals in amounts approximating the recommended daily intake guidelines. A tablet offering insufficient dosages of key nutrients--such as beta-carotene, iron, and vitamins D, C and E--may be a waste of money.

If your multivitamin includes lecithin, choline, inositol, nickel, silicon, tin or vanadium, that's fine. But don't let it influence your purchasing decision. The health benefits of these nutrients haven't been firmly established.

And don't select your multivitamin based on its content of phosphorus, iodine, manganese, chloride, molybdenum or boron. Almost everyone gets an adequate intake of these minerals through their diets. Two B vitamins--biotin and pantothenic acid--are also well covered by most diets.

Coenzyme Q10 (COQ10)--important for cellular energy--is another component that you should watch out for. The amount of this enzyme contained in most multivitamins is too small to have cardiovascular benefit. If you want to significantly boost your intake, look for a separate COQ10 supplement.

And beware any multivitamin containing calcium or magnesium. There's no way a pill packed with other nutrients could also hold enough calcium or magnesium to make an impact on your health. A day's worth couldn't even fit into one pill. If you need extra calcium and magnesium in your diet, buy a separate calcium-magnesium supplement. The same goes for selenium: If you need it, take a separate pill.

Some firms toss in as many ingredients as possible. For example, there's little evidence that scant amounts of ginseng, alfalfa, cayenne, RNA or bee pollen in some multivitamin pills do much of anything. And be leery of one-a-day pills containing dehydrated vegetables such as bell peppers, broccoli or parsley. Think about it: Even if you add back the water, you wouldn't get a thimble's worth of the original vegetable.

Herbs, carotenoids, flavonoids, isoflavones and other phytochemicals are also sometimes sprinkled into supplements, but again, usually in quantities that aren't large enough to have a significant impact on your health. So if you want to increase the amount of isoflavones in your diet, for example, don't count on your multivitamin. Look for a separate isoflavone supplement.