Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Multivitamins may lower heart disease death risk

A team of researchers from the University of Washington report that daily use of multivitamins over a 10-year period may reduce the risk of death from heart disease by 16%.

Researchers from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center at the University of Washington recently analyzed the use of multivitamin supplements, vitamin C, and vitamin E over a ten year period. Correlations between 5-year total mortality and death from cancer or cardiovascular disease (CVD) were assessed.

Data from 77,719 Washington residents aged 50 to 76 were obtained by questionnaire. A series of analyses showed that use of multivitamins was associated with a 16% lower risk of death from cardiovascular disease (95% CI: 0.01-0.3). Intakes of vitamin E over 215 milligrams per day over the course of ten years were also associated with a 28% reduction in the risk of death from CVD (95% CI: 0.12-0.31).

Multivitamin use alone was not associated with a decreased risk of total mortality, but both vitamin C and E were associated with decreases in risk of total mortality. Similarly, vitamin C did not correlate with a reduced risk of death from CVD while both multivitamins and vitamin E did.