Vitamin C helps preserve vitamin E in smokers

	Tweet

Vitamin C supplements can help reduce the high rate of vitamin E depletion that occurs in smokers, according to the findings of a small study published in the journal Free Radical Biology and Medicine.

As senior investigator Dr. Maret G. Traber told Reuters Health, “if you are under oxidative stress, have low vitamin C intakes, then vitamin E doesn’t do its job as well as it should and gets destroyed.”

Vitamin C supplements appear to reduce this tendency in smokers, Traber of Oregon State University, Corvallis and colleagues report, based on the findings of a study with 11 smokers and 13 nonsmokers.

"We studied college-age people who smoked a half a pack to a pack of cigarettes per day,” she said. The subjects were randomly assigned to receive vitamin C supplements at 500 mg twice daily for 2 weeks or placebo.

After 2 weeks, the study participants switched over to the other treatment. In both phases of the study, the subjects did not know if they were receiving a supplement or placebo.

The researchers found that during the placebo phase, tocopherols, the active form of vitamin E, disappeared significantly faster in smokers than in non-smokers. The disappearance rates of blood levels of alpha-tocopherol in smokers were inversely correlated with blood levels of vitamin C.

Vitamin C supplements in both groups slowed the disappearance rate of alpha-tocopherol by 25 percent and blood levels of gamma-tocopherol by 45 percent.

“Vitamin E and vitamin C have been predicted to interact based on more than 50 years of test tube studies,” Traber continued. “This is the first demonstration that vitamin E reacts with vitamin C in the human body.”

SOURCE: Free Radical Biology and Medicine, February 15, 2006.

RELATED STORIES:
Mental Health Charity Calls for Cannabis Probe   Crack cocaine a substantial problem in London   Perceived access to cigarettes predicts youth smoking   Marijuana Worsens COPD Symptoms in Current Cigarette Smokers   Marijuana Use May Hurt Intellectual Skills in MS Patients   Current cigarette smokers at increased risk of seizures   Latest survey finds more US teens are smoking   Smoking Associated With More Rapid Progression of MS   Cigarettes and alcohol worse than ecstasy, LSD and cannabis   M. D. Anderson Offers Guidance on Choosing Tobacco Cessation Products   Can Islam Help Muslim Smokers to Quit?   Effort to Stop Smoking is More Intense for Women

Comments

[ + Post Your Own ]

Now you're in the public comment zone. What follows is not Armenian Medical Network's stuff; it comes from other people and we don't vouch for it. A reminder: By using this Web site you agree to accept our Terms of Service. Click here to read the Rules of Engagement.

There are no comments for this entry yet. [ + Comment here + ]