Photo Credit: Toa Heftiba
This week I’m doing a blog series on supplements. Today’s post is about the importance of high-quality supplements. Later this week I’ll post about how to know which supplements to take.
I’ll start this blog with a funny, true story. My first year in practice I had a little, sweet old granny ask me for an evaluation of her supplements and vitamins. I evaluate every patient’s vitamins to make sure they:
1. Are necessary
2. Strengthen patients and help them get the results they’re looking for.
The next visit, she ROLLED IN A SUITCASE of various supplements that she has “taken over the years.” I cringed inside knowing that a part of why she wasn’t feeling well was that she was taking too many low-quality supplements that were irritating her system. She heard that certain supplements were good for everyone to take, so she kept adding more to her regimen.
Unfortunately, taking too many supplements has become the norm!
I will be the first person to admit that I’m a minimalist when it comes to giving vitamins to my patients. Later this week I’ll talk about why taking so many supplements can be bad for your health. I’ll also discuss how you can best determine which supplements you need.
First, though, I want to talk about why the TYPE of supplement you take matters.
The Best Way to Get Vitamins and Nutrients is in Food
Supplements should be supplementary to a good diet. Let me explain. Diet is king in all aspects of our health. Healthy, natural foods will utilize and absorb vitamins into your body better than any over-the-counter supplement.
The old saying goes “you are what you eat.” I want to modify that with “you are also what you absorb.” Some well-meaning practitioners give their patients a lot of supplements. These may actually be the correct vitamins, but it’s possible the patient is not able to absorb them (leaky gut, poor adrenal/thyroid health, etc.). It’s clear that the best way for us to get our vitamins is directly consuming them through food. For example, it’s best to get iodine eating wild cod. Or you can get minerals and nutrients from eating bone broth. You get chlorophyll from green, leafy vegetables. And so on.
Wouldn’t it be great if there was a way to absorb a supplement the same you absorb food? Well, that leads us to my next point.
Supplement Type Matters…a LOT
The type of supplement that you take MATTERS. I’m so sorry to pick on run-of-the-mill drug store supplements. Although they seem inexpensive, most will not produce the results that you ultimately want. The reason for this is that most of the over-the-counter supplements only contain a fraction of the active vitamin. That’s like going to a car dealership and only getting a fraction of the car that you want. You will only get a fraction of what you desire.
Instead of the active vitamin, the rest of the supplement is rounded out with fillers, chemicals, and other synthetic ingredients. So, why does that matter? Those other products were added alongside of that vitamin to fluff it out and make it cheaper to produce and sell to you. So, you get what you pay for.
I want to offer two better solutions when it comes to supplements:
Eat your vitamins in food – it’s more important to eat a clean, healthy vitamin-loaded diet than to load up with supplements. If you are taking 5-10 types of supplements, ask yourself the question: are you having to make up for something that’s lacking in your diet? Most of the time, the answer is YES! Remember, that you only need supplements to help SUPPORT what you’re working through (hormone balance, headaches, digestive disorders, joint pain).
Take whole food-based supplements - there are many good quality supplement companies that do a great job of quality control on supplements. They have very strict testing and production measurements to ensure that only the purest and cleanest products are sold to their customers. The line that I use in my office meets those standards. It’s called Standard Process. They create whole foods-based supplements. Take a tour of their Wisconsin farm sometime. You’ll see where they grow food and make their vitamins/herbs. I’ve done this and was impressed at how strict they are with the quality of their products. You should be that strict too! Why? When you take whole food-quality products, the active vitamin is at 100% of what it says in the bottle. It's the closest thing to getting your vitamins from food. Oftentimes in the office, I have patients say “I took that supplement and it didn’t work for me.” Well, it could be that you took a synthetic chemical-filled supplement that didn’t have enough active product in it, so your body couldn’t digest and metabolize it. But taking a whole foods approach where your body can recognize and absorb the nutrients will produce profoundly different results. You can find some of my favorite products in my online store, click here. As always, talk to your doctor to make sure anything you are taking is appropriate for your health needs.
So, I just want you to know that what you put into your body matters. Food should be first, and a food-based supplement can help too. The saying “you get what you pay for” definitely rings true in the world of supplements! Although you might think that paying more for high quality supplements is not worth it, it’s more expensive in the long run to potentially suffer the side effects from bad supplementation.
If you are concerned that the vitamins that you’re taking may not be helping you and you’d like a full evaluation on your health needs, click the link below to schedule your appointment!
If you are interested in further addressing this topic, please feel free to reach out and schedule an appointment. Dr. V is a Chiropractor and Functional Medicine Doctor in Elmhurst, Illinois who evaluates patients from the inside out, focusing on areas including hormone imbalance, digestive health, anxiety/depression, autoimmune disease, and many others.