Misinformation about vitamin E and heart health

Debunker Debunked

I have GOT to stop watching the Today show.

I’m pretty sure my blood pressure spikes to dangerous levels every time I catch an appearance by NBC chief medical editor Dr. Nancy Snyderman. She never ceases to infuriate me.

Recently, Dr. Snyderman paid a visit to promote her book: “Medical Myths that can Kill You and the 101 Truths That Will Save, Extend, and Improve Your Life.”

See, Dr. Snyderman doesn’t offer mere “tips” to save your life – she provides “truths.” Proving that sometimes the “truth” might kill you too.

Truth or dare

In Dr. Snyderman’s interview with Matt Lauer, she made a couple of statements I agreed with, and tossed off a couple of debatable opinions. But then she went after dietary supplements.

Keep in mind that Dr. Snyderman offering observations about supplements is like a vegetarian offering opinions on pot roast recipes.

Matt: “A lot of people who are worried about heart disease, Nancy, specifically take vitamin E. Is there a connection between taking vitamin E and improving your heart health?”

Snyderman: “No, it just gives you expensive urine.”

Here, she and Matt enjoyed a condescending laugh over her sparkling bon mot. She continued: “The most recent study taking C and E showed it didn’t have any impact on heart health at all. You’re better off, frankly, to take an aspirin, exercise, eat a decent diet, and make sure your doctor says you’re okay.”

I guess in Dr. Snyderman’s world, a recent study is so much more impressive than whatever studies have come before.

Say, for instance, a 2005 study that appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Brigham and Women’s Hospital (Harvard Medical School) researchers divided nearly 40,000 healthy women into three groups to take either 600 IU of vitamin E, an aspirin, or a placebo for 10 years. Overall, neither the vitamin E nor the aspirin lowered risk of heart attack or stroke. But among women in the vitamin E group who were over the age of 65, heart attack risk was reduced by nearly 35 percent while risk of cardiovascular death was cut in half.

The published study didn’t report on the expense of their urine.

Of course, I could cite other studies that show the heart health benefits of vitamin E supplements (New England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 328, No. 20, 1444-1449). But I have to admit there is an important effect that aspirin provides that vitamin E does not: Regular aspirin use increases risk of internal bleeding.

As I mentioned in an e-Alert I sent you just last week, the American Gastroenterological Association estimates that well over 100,000 hospitalizations per year are attributed to adverse gastrointestinal events linked to long-term use of aspirin and other nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. About 15 percent of those patients die – approximately 16,500 deaths per year.

And that’s a medical truth.

Source:
“Vitamin E in the Primary Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease and Cancer” Journal of the American Medical Association” Vol. 294, No. 1, 7/6/05, jama.ama-assn.org