Do You Need Supplements?

Today I was doing my usual intern and I received a young man. The latter was feeling a lot of stress and fatigue lately. He had been feeding on junk food for the past week and he was asking me if he needed to take in supplements. The answer is...

NO!

A well-balanced diet, well-proportioned both in quantity and quality, is sufficient to cover all your nutritive needs. It is not necessary to take vitamin or mineral pills, which are both unnecessary and expensive.

A balanced diet refers to intake of appropriate types and adequate amounts of foods and drinks to supply nutrition and energy for the maintenance of body cells, tissues, and organs, and to support normal growth and development.

Below is a definition of a dietary supplement from US Food and Drug administration:

A dietary supplement is a product taken by mouth that contains a "dietary ingredient" intended to supplement the diet. The "dietary ingredients" in these products may include: vitamins, minerals, herbs or other botanicals, amino acids, and substances such as enzymes, organ tissues, glandulars, and metabolites. Dietary supplements can also be extracts or concentrates, and may be found in many forms such as tablets, capsules, softgels, gelcaps, liquids, or powders. They can also be in other forms, such as a bar, but if they are, information on their label must not represent the product as a conventional food or a sole item of a meal or diet. Whatever their form may be, DSHEA places dietary supplements in a special category under the general umbrella of "foods," not drugs, and requires that every supplement be labeled a dietary supplement.

Here are the reasons why you should not take in supplements and instead focus on eating a well balanced and varied meal:

• If you think it's simple to just take in supplements when you have not eaten well, then you are on the wrong track. No supplement can provide you with the nutrients found in a fruit, a vegetable soup or a yoghurt. Fruits and vegetables, for example, provide you with vitamins and minerals and are even better, because they contain fibres, satisfy your thirst, contain little calories and are delicious to eat.


• Besides if you take supplements everyday, this may have a cumulative effect on your system which may be disastrous to your health. An excess of vitamins and minerals can be as harmful as a lack of vitamins and minerals. If you really need vitamins and minerals supplements, take the recommendations of your doctor or a qualified pharmacologist. If you are taking the supplements, check their labels and make sure not to go beyond the number of days the supplements have been prescribed for. If the supplements do not have any label pointing out the number and period you must take them, then just cast them aside. You are better off without them.

What about calcium supplements?

Calcium and Vitamin D supplements must be taken only when recommended to do so by your doctor, when you are lacking in calcium and you are at risk of osteoporosis. Your needs are probably covered if you:

• consume about 3 to 4 dairy products per day or if you drink a lot water enriched with calcium. Read the labels well and ask about the quality of the water supplied to you at your water distributor centre to see if the water is enriched with calcium.


• like to go out and enjoy sunlight. Tha action of the sun on your skin produces vitamin D and if you get sufficient sunlight per day, then there is no need to take in vitamin D. You can perform outdoor physical activities everyday so that you get to exercise a bit and at the same time, resource your body with vitamin D.

Foods enriched with Omega 3

They are not necessary if you consume fish like salmon, sardine and if you are a vegan, certain types of vegetable oils like soja oil or a tsp of flaxseed oil in your salad where you can get omega 3 naturally.

Moreover, omega 3 works best if it is taken with other nutrients, therefore with the foods you are eating during a meal.

Supplements made from plants

Preparations of medicinal products or supplements from plants have always existed in most traditions. There exists many supplements made from plants but their nutritional efficiency have been rarely proven. These last years, certain products, whose compositions have not been well known, have proven to be dangerous for our health.

What about when I'm practising a sport?

Besides the physical efforts, there is no need for supplements like drinks made for athletes which are "supposed" to ameliorate your performances except when recommended by your doctor.


There are many miraculous products out there supposed to cure a lot of diseases or to make you feel better. NEVER FALL FOR THEM!!! The only real "supplement" you need is fresh foods which you can easily obtain at a market and a lot of water in sufficient quantities.