Supplements - Editor's Choice

Over the years, Earth Clinic readers have sent us many reports about their treatments for Supplements. The editors at Earth Clinic consider the below posts to be some of the most helpful and informative and have named them 'Editor's Choice'. We hope that you will find this useful.
The comments below reflect the personal experiences and opinions of readers and do not represent medical advice or the views of this website. The information shared has not been evaluated by the FDA and is not intended to diagnose, treat, or prevent any disease or health condition. Always consult a qualified healthcare professional for medical concerns.

Supplement Advice

Posted by Bill (San Fernando, Philippines) on 01/25/2010

Editor's Choice

I've given up taking many supplements long ago -- I always try and take the natural form if possible, and completely agree with Ted's low opinion of multivitamin supplements particularly being insoluble and not capable of being digested.

I read an article not long ago(sorry, can't remember the website) where the article author was analyzing the usefulness, efficacy and safety of supplements. So he went to a city sewage complex and questioned the sewage manager, the main man who dealt mainly with human sewage. On questioning him, this sewage manager freely admitted that, everyday, when he inspected the human sewage, he saw thousands upon thousands of multi-coloured pills in the faeces, which could only have been multivitamin pills and other supplements. All undigested.

So what Ted says about pills being insoluble and therefore useless is entirely correct.

Whenever I do take any form of pill supplement -- such as simple Ascorbic Acid -- I always pulverize it into a powder first and then dissolve this in a glass of water before I take it(as per Ted's advice). With Ascorbic acid, I also add baking soda to the solution to create the much friendlier and absorbable alkaline form of vitamin C -- Sodium Ascorbate. And even when I do this alkalizing procedure I have to scrape off the strange scum that forms on the surface of the water(caused by the strange binding agents and additives in the pill).

Most vitamin and multi-vitamin manufacturers don't give a tinker's cuss whether their products are in the right form for your body or not, they just produce a bright shiny-coloured pill that looks nice, that puts you into a trusting comfort zone, and yet does nothing whatsoever for your body.

The supplement pill is usually packed with strange binding agents like magnesium stearate, stearic acid, micro-cellulose agents, starch etc. In other words, if your are convinced by the advertising then you've been emotionally suckered by the supplement pill manufacturers and you may be buying something that is completely useless and not so body-friendly.

So the only way is to educate yourself. Anyone who comes to this Earth Clinic site will soon learn more about herbs, body-friendly chemicals and natural medications than at any other website I know. Here, they show both sides -- the yeas and nays -- of a protocol. Better than any expensive, double-blind placebo, FDA steered wacko research anyday. And the part I love about this site is that everyone tries to genuinely help each other. There is no more honest and better way.