I intend to start this post a little back to front.
Vitamins are not enough. As important as they are, vitamins can do nothing for the body without the presence of minerals. Vitamins can not be absorbed or function within our bodies without the aid of minerals. While the body is capable of synthesizing a few vitamins, it is incapable of manufacturing a single mineral.
About 18 different minerals are known to be required for the body to maintain and regulate it's functions, although only 6 have an established Recommended Daily Allowance ( RDA ) : Calcium, Iodine, Iron, Magnesium, Phosphorus & Zinc.
The known active minerals in bodies are: Calcium, Chlorine, Chromium, Cobalt, Copper, Fluorine, Iodine, Iron, Magnesium, Manganese, Molybdenum, Phosphorus, Potassium, Selenium, Sodium, Sulphur, Vanadium & Zinc.
So What are vitamins?
Most , I'm sure, would think tablets. The over the counter form of these essential, micro-nutrients are nothing more than a top up to the macro-nutrients of our food, you can not stop eating and live on vitamins & minerals. The food we eat supplies the fats, proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals & energy we need to survive.
Why take a vitamin/mineral supplement?
In an ideal world, with an ideal diet, a supplement would not be necessary. Our food would not be processed, refined and modified, our bodies would not be subject to toxins and stresses that further deplete the body's stores.
It is easy to be fooled into thinking that food manufacturers are sensitive to our health needs. After all do they not 'enrich' our bread and cereals with vitamins? Well yes, they do. What isn't mentioned is the twenty or so nutrients that are lost in processing.
What strength Multi-Vitamin?
The answer to that is a combination of personal preference and life style. If you prefer to take a standard, low dose, RDA multi-vitamin & mineral, I would advise an A-Z. This will at least ensure a full range of all the important nutrients.
My own personal preference is for a medium to high dose multi-vitamin & mineral. The higher doses are very safe and produced well within the upper safety range. The higher doses are particularly important if you live in a large town or city where air pollution may be high. If you play at lot of sport or exercise regularly at home or the gym. Alcohol, coffee and smoking will also increase your body's need for additional nutrients.
The final thing to consider is timed release supplements. Most vitamins are water soluble and can not be stored in the body. This means that within 2-3 hours they will have passed through the body, what ever can not be utilised in that time will then be excreted. Timed release vitamins are released slowly over 8-12 hours and offer optimum effectiveness.
The body is a wondrously, fine tuned instrument, far too complicated and for some snooze worthy, to go into here. We all, in one way or another, punish and abuse our body, yet it adapts and keeps going, but as the saying goes, at some point, somethings got to give. Supplements can give you and your body the edge it needs to stave off the inevitable.
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