Common tips about vitamins you need to know

Vitamin supplementation through food

The amount of vitamins in the human body is less than 1%, but it is very important. Vitamins neither participate in the formation of human cells nor provide energy for the human body, but play an important role in the growth, metabolism and development of the human body.

Vitamins cannot be synthesized naturally in the human body and can be obtained through food. There are also various vitamin supplements on the market. Some vitamins appear in pharmacies as over-the-counter medicines, while others are dressed as supplements.

Overdose of vitamins can lead to poisoning

There are 13 types of vitamins currently recognized, which are divided into fat-soluble vitamins and water-soluble vitamins. The properties of vitamins are different, and the storage time in the body is also different. For vitamins that are not easy to be excreted from the body, once accumulated in excess, poisoning may occur.

Vitamins A, D, E, and K are fat-soluble vitamins. These vitamins are easy to accumulate in the nerves, so they will be stored in the body for a long time, and some may even be stored for more than half a year.

Vitamin C and 8 B vitamins are water-soluble vitamins. Many people know about vitamins B1, B2, B6 and B12, in fact, niacin (B3), pantothenic acid (B5), folic acid (B9), biotin (B7) are also B vitamins. Some water-soluble vitamins are easily excreted from the body, and the storage time in the body is only two or three days, such as vitamin B1 and vitamin B2, which will be excreted through the urine soon after ingestion.

In response to the problem of liver failure caused by excessive intake of vitamins, Zhao Xinyan, chief physician of the Liver Disease Center of Beijing Friendship Hospital affiliated to Capital Medical University, explained that drug-induced liver injury caused by dietary supplements is generally divided into direct liver injury and idiosyncratic injury. The former means that the more medicines are taken, the greater the chance of liver damage and the more serious it is; the latter means that the body reacts too strongly to the ingested health products or medicines, causing discomfort and eventually leading to metabolism. In severe cases, liver dysfunction can occur.

Ways to reduce vitamin loss from food

Vitamin A is a vitamin that is generally lacking in Chinese people, because water-soluble vitamins are not easy to retain in the body, and the lack of vitamin B1 and B2 is also relatively common.

Solving the problem of vitamin deficiency is also simple. Generally speaking, with a reasonable food mix and balanced nutrition, we can get enough vitamins from our daily diet without taking external vitamin supplements. Appropriate cooking methods are also very important. Frying takes the vitamins down considerably. The alkali added to make the meat taste more tender also destroys vitamins B1, B2 and C in large quantities.

Not all vitamins are afraid of heat, and even those that are afraid of heat can have some ways to avoid destroying them during cooking. For example, although vitamin C is heat-resistant, it becomes very heat-resistant if some acidic substances are added during the cooking process. Tomatoes and lemons are inherently sour, so nutrients are not lost as much during cooking.