Nutrient/vitamin stacking
Cold and flu season is upon us and while it almost feels inevitable that you will get sick at some point. This is also the season where I see many people going to the chemist to stock up on high dose Vitamin C and other products which are marketed as ‘immune boosting’.
One thing I always encourage people not to do is self-prescribing supplements, because rarely are they having the effect that they want them to. I can’t tell you how many random supplements I bought before starting my degree, that I would throw out half-empty or stopped taking when I didn’t feel they were doing what I hoped, and I want to save you from doing the same. Amongst that, I want to share some more reasons why this isn’t a good idea (I have touched on this before in another blog titled ‘Practitioner-only vs over the counter supplements) but this is a more in depth breakdown!
Quality matters! The form and quality of the nutrient in your tablet will dictate how well it absorbs in your body, how readily available it is for use, and how many steps it has to go through to be broken down (hint: poor forms means a longer breaking down process and very little therapeutic benefit by the time it gets to where it needs to be). Many commercial brands use cheap and poor form nutrients in their supplements, which is why I only ever work with practitioner-only supplements that undergo rigorous testing, quality control and research.
Therapeutic dosage - commercial over the counter products use recommended daily intake dosages & fall under dietary supplements which are general across the whole population. If you truly do have a deficiency in one nutrient, the amount you are getting in that dosage is not enough to have a therapeutic effect. This is why as practitioners we dose based on therapeutic dosages - which means the quantity needed to elicit the desired affect in response to individualised treatment.
Nutrient balance & stacking - here is where things get complex! Every vitamin and nutrient has what we call antagonists which are other vitamins or nutrients which block their absorption and inhibit uptake in the body. Many commercial products don’t account for this. On the opposite side of that, there are many nutrients and vitamins which are synergists for each other, meaning they help enhance the effect, which is accounted for in practitioner only supplements.
An example of this I see in a very popular women’s multivitamin is between zinc, vitamin B12, and iron. Zinc works against both these nutrients to block absorption into the body, meaning that it’s unlikely you are absorbing any b12 and iron.
Another example is the close relationship between copper and iron. What is perceived to be iron deficiency can sometimes be copper deficiency, and by supplementing with only iron, it causes a further imbalance by suppressing copper even further down.
How does this differ from eating foods that have many different vitamins and minerals present? Dosage! It’s the high dosage in these supplements which are responsible for cancelling out or disturbing the balance of the others.
What works for someone else, might not work for you. I spent 4.5 years doing in-depth study of the human body and I can’t stress enough how complex we all are. I often see two clients with very similar conditions who need very different treatment. This is why a supplement that worked for a friend or you heard was good for your condition might not be the best for you.
Medication & health condition interactions - while vitamins, nutrients, and herbs are natural, that doesn’t always mean they are safe. They can interact with medications and many are contraindicated in certain health conditions. Before I prescribe anything to my clients, I do lots of research to make sure it’s not going to cause an upset somewhere else in the body.
Now I wish I could give you more clarity about how to pick your vitamins, but I would be lying if I said there was one perfect way to pick to do so - because there truly isn’t. Every single client I see has a different need and something different going on in their bodies.
This information is not to deter you from vitamins and supplements, but instead to show you how complex the interplay between them is and in the long run, to save you time and money taking unnecessary supplements.
If you are looking for more individualised support this winter, I offer 15 minute online acute consultations — tailored to support things like colds and flus which need symptomatic relief. This gives you access to practitioner-only supplements and herbs.
Click here to book