Quote by Just_A_Guy_You_Know
My Ph.D. is actually in a psychology-related field. Personally, I'm not a big advocate for diagnosing, which seems to me like trying to fit someone into a neat categorical box when human experience is varied, and unique in a lot of ways. Some people find them helpfule, but often patients get a label, treat it as explanatory, conform to it in their behaviour, and then use it as an excuse to do nothing about it. Diagnosis is necessary for insurance purposes, and can be helpful to clinicians in communicating about common clusters of symptoms, but for patients, I don't see too much value in it usually. Also it's important to avoid being totally defined by a diagnosis. I might feel depressed or anxious more than I'd like, but it's only one part of who I am, and often not the most salient part of my identity.

Quote by DamonX
By all means, please do look into the evidence. But look at everything. Not just the ones that suit your needs. After half a century of study, the general consensus is that vitamin c supplementation has no benefit whatsoever. Please consult with any Phd in nutrition or a registered dietitian. I think you'll have a hard time finding anyone who thinks that excessive vitamin C supplementation is beneficial. In fact, if anyone is suggesting that you take vitamin C as a daily supplement... they are probably trying to sell you vitamin C.

Quote by DamonX
I wasn't waving anything in front of you. I was just surprised that you felt the need to present me with knowledge that you either didn't know I had...or you were just trying to present mass amounts of knowledge to the other people that might read these posts. If I was a dumb person, I would take offence, but really, I realize that you were just trying to impress the last remaining few that haven't been bored to death by your continuous misplaced essays. I would never assume to lecture you on engineering. Please accord me the equivalent professional courtesy when it comes to aspects of academic knowledge that I have education in.

Quote by DamonX
SereneProdigy's essay illustrating your numerous faults would actually get my vote for best post of the year.

Quote by DamonX
Well, then how would I know that? What a worthless thing to say. Come on guy...you're better than that. And if you have an interest in nutrition, but yet you haven't educated yourself with the basics.. something's wrong. The reason why I suggest people purchase an actual nutrition textbook is because it provides everyone with the basic knowledge that allows people to then pursue the field if they want.

Quote by DamonX
I have no idea what your vitamin intake is. Whether or not it's beneficial is another discussion. I guess I'm just "uneducated" compared to you. I guess all the people that have devoted their lives to the study of nutrition are "uneducated" compared to you as well.

Quote by DamonX
Correct. And why are those studies not still being held up as the be all and end all from vitamin C advocates? Because in science, results have to be recreated in various populations to be deemed valid. You can't just cherry-pick some bullshit study from 50 years ago and use that as a basis for nutrient recommendations. Which is why every scientist in the world agrees that excessive vitamin C intake is worthless. If you want to use scientific evidence as an argument you need to look at systematic reviews or meta analysis. Any ridiculous theory has some ancient half-assed study to support it. As the highest level of statistical evidence, we evaluate every study, do a statistical regression analysis and make an informed recommendation based on the findings.

Quote by ]We found that in the general community, ≥1 g/day vitamin C had no effect on common cold incidence (risk ratio (RR) 0.98; 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.95 to 1.01; I² statistic = 0%; 7308 participants; 20 studies; moderate quality evidence).Within-trial heterogeneity was significant in few trials. Trials involving participants doing intense physical exercise found that vitamin C had a protective effect against colds (RR 0.49; 95% CI 0.37 to 0.64; I² statistic = 0%; 622 participants; 7 studies; high quality evidence; number-needed-to-treat-to-benefit (NNTB) = 3 to 10).

In adults, ≥1 g/day vitamin C shortened cold duration by 8% (95% CI 4% to 12%;I² statistic = 18%; 6672 colds; 17 studies; high quality evidence), and in children by 18% (95% CI 9% to 26%; I² statistic = 48%; 1534 colds; 10 studies; high quality evidence).

Regular ≥1 g/day vitamin C administration reduced numbers of days indoors and off work and school by 13.6% (95% CI 7% to20%; I² statistic = 31%; 4388 colds; 8 studies; high quality evidence), and symptom severity scores by 12.8% (95% CI 4.8% to 21%;I² statistic = 24%; 1730 colds; 7 studies; high quality evidence).

Therapeutic doses of 1.5 to 4 g/day vitamin C (given after cold symptoms appear) did not influence common cold duration (-2%;95% CI -7% to +2%; 3299 colds; 12 studies; high quality evidence), but 8 g on the first day shortened colds by 19% (95% CI 5% to32%; 718 colds; one study; high quality evidence). In therapeutic studies, the difference in the duration of days indoors and off work was 12% shorter (95% CI -25% to 0.8%; 2641 colds; 7 studies; high quality evidence).

Quote by [url=http://www.mv.helsinki.fi/home/hemila/CC/CochraneColds_2016.pdf
Vitamin C for preventing and treating the common cold]Analysis 1.1.3 included seven studies with participants undergoing heavy, short-term physical activity. Vitamin C halved the incidence of colds (RR 0.49; 95% CI 0.37 to 0.64; P value 10−6;622 participants; 7 studies; I² = 0%; high quality evidence). Three studies were with marathon runners (Moolla 1996a;Peters 1993a;Peters 1996a), one with students in a skiing school in the Swiss Alps (Ritzel 1961), one with Canadian army troops on subarctic operations (Sabiston 1974), and two very small studies with participants after an exercise test (Carillo 2008a;Carillo 2008b).

All of these seven studies were randomised and double-blind. In three studies, the dose of vitamin C was < 1 g/day (Moolla 1996a;Peters 1993a;Peters 1996a) so that the benefit in this subgroup cannot be explained by particularly high vitamin C doses. Instead the benefits seem to be caused by the extraordinary conditions of the participants.

Quote by SereneProdigy previously
Although the three papers have serious biases, they have been used singly or in the combinations of two as references in nutritional recommendations, in medical textbooks, in texts on infectious diseases and on nutrition, when the authors claimed that vitamin C had been shown to be ineffective for colds [1] (pp. 21–23, 36–38, 42–45). The American Medical Association, for example, officially stated that “One of the most widely misused vitamins is ascorbic acid. There is no reliable evidence that large doses of ascorbic acid prevent colds or shorten their duration” [113], a statement that was based entirely on Chalmers’s 1975 review.

Quote by DamonX
I would never suggest that you accept everything I say. I am an expert in a field just like you are an expert in yours. I have a lot of education in nutrition, but it's not my area of expertise. By all means learn all you can if you are interested in the field. The fact that you would discount a university text book, (which is essentially the accumulation of thousands of people's knowledge and a hundred years of study) is a bit disconcerting.

Quote by [url=https://www.mheducation.com/highered/product/wardlaw-s-contemporary-nutrition-smith-collene/M1259709965.html
Wardlaw's Contemporary Nutrition[/url]]Contemporary Nutrition is a complete and balanced resource for nutrition information written at a level non-science majors can understand. Current research is at the core of the eleventh edition, with revised statistics, incorporation of new results of clinical trials, and updated recommendations. The text provides students who lack a strong science background the ideal balance of reliable nutrition information and practical consumer-oriented knowledge.

Quote by DamonX
And by the way... if you are really concerned about antioxidants, maybe do some research into the effect of smoking on oxidative effects on the human body. I'm pretty sure that you'll find that smoking cessation has a much more proven track record on anti-oxidation than spending 30 bucks month on orange flavoured pills.

Quote by DamonX
A somehow reasonable response.

Quote by DamonX
"vitamins, supplements, or exotic foods that are supposed to have special health benefits?"

I think "supposed to " is the most important part of that sentence.

Unless you are homeless, a drug addict, or have a crazy weird diet, you will not be deficient in any of the essential nutrients.

If you are concerned about nutrition I suggest you pick up a book on basic nutrition and learn the basics instead of spending money on stuff you don't need.

This is a university textbook, and thus will run you about 100 bucks. But it's actual science based information. Not garbage internet propaganda trying to sell you something.

Quote by DamonX
Ok... So you are taking a multi vitamin which already has more vitamin C that any human being would ever need... So why are you taking extra vitamin C on top of that?

I'm just curious as to your reasoning.

Vitamin C (ascorbic acid) is a water soluble vitamin. That means it's not stored in your body. If you take more than you need, it's excreted in your urine. So essentially what you are doing is paying 20-30 dollars a month for bright orange colored pee.

Please explain...

In the meantime, I have some magic beans you might be interested in.

Quote by ]Fruit and vegetable consumption among American adults remained relatively stable from 1994 through 2005 (55). For example, average daily fruit intake in persons ≥2 y of age remained the same from 1994–1996 to 1999–2002 (1.6 servings), and average vegetable consumption declined slightly from 3.4 to 3.2 servings/d during the same period (56). Increased intake of vitamin C–containing foods was unlikely to have contributed to the reduced prevalence of vitamin C deficiency during the recent survey.

(...)

In prosperous societies, supplement consumption has a significant effect on body stores and circulating concentrations of vitamin C. In NHANES 1999–2000, 52% of adults reported consumption of supplements in the past month, and 35% of adults were regular users of multivitamins (58). Usage rates in children were similar but lower in adolescents. These recent data show increased usage since the overall 40% usage reported during NHANES III (58) and are likely to explain in part the improved vitamin C status of the US population.

(...)

Adults who were nonusers of vitamin C supplements had a significantly higher prevalence of vitamin C deficiency than did users (Table 6).

Quote by [url=https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5409678/
Vitamin C and Infections]In the interval from 1972 to 1975, five placebo-controlled trials were published that used ≥2 g/day of vitamin C. Those five studies were published after Pauling’s book and therefore they formally tested Pauling’s hypothesis. A meta-analysis by Hemilä (1996) showed that there was very strong evidence from the five studies that colds were shorter or less severe in the vitamin C groups (p = 10−5), and therefore those studies corroborated Pauling’s hypothesis that vitamin C was indeed effective against colds [70].

Quote by ]Given the strong evidence from studies published before 1970 that vitamin C has beneficial effects against the common cold, and from the ≥2 g/day vitamin C studies published between 1972 and 1975 [70], it is puzzling that the interest in vitamin C and the common cold collapsed after 1975 so that few small trials on vitamin C and the common cold have been conducted thereafter (Figure 1).

This sudden loss of interest can be explained by the publication of the three highly important papers in 1975 (Figure 1). These papers are particularly influential because of their authors and the publication forums. Two of the papers were published in JAMA [72,73], and the third paper was published in the American Journal of Medicine [71]. Both of these journals are highly influential medical journals with extensive circulations. Two of the papers were authored by Thomas Chalmers [71,72], who was a highly respected and influential pioneer of RCTs [1,102,103], and the third paper was authored by Paul Meier [73], who was a highly influential statistician, e.g., one of the authors of the widely used Kaplan–Meier method [1,104,105].

Karlowski, Chalmers, et al. (1975) [72] published the results of a RCT in JAMA, in which 6 g/day of vitamin C significantly shortened the duration of colds (Figure 2A). However, these authors claimed that the observed benefit was not caused by the physiological effects of vitamin C, but by the placebo effect. However, the “placebo-effect explanation” was shown afterwards to be erroneous. For example, Karlowski et al. had excluded 42% of common cold episodes from the subgroup analysis that was the basis for their conclusion, without giving any explanation of why so many participants were excluded. The numerous problems of the placebo explanation are detailed in a critique by Hemilä [1,106,107]. Chalmers wrote a response [108], but did not answer the specific issues raised [109].

In the same year (1975), Chalmers published a review of the vitamin C and common cold studies. He pooled the results of seven studies and calculated that vitamin C would shorten colds only by 0.11 (SE 0.24) days [71]. Such a small difference has no clinical importance and the SE indicates that it is simply explained by random variation. However, there were errors in the extraction of data, studies that used very low doses of vitamin C (down to 0.025 g/day) were included, and there were errors in the calculations [1,110]. Pauling had proposed that vitamin C doses should be ≥1 g/day. When Hemilä and Herman (1995) included only those studies that had used ≥1 g/day of vitamin C and extracted data correctly, they calculated that colds were 0.93 (SE 0.22) days shorter, which is over eight times that calculated by Chalmers, and highly significant (p = 0.01) [110].

The third paper was a review published in JAMA by Michael Dykes and Paul Meier (1975). They analyzed selected studies and concluded that there was no convincing evidence that vitamin C has effects on colds [73]. However, they did not calculate the estimates of the effect nor any p-values, and many comments in their analysis were misleading. Pauling wrote a manuscript in which he commented upon the review by Dykes and Meier and submitted it to JAMA. Pauling stated afterwards that his paper was rejected even after he twice made revisions to meet the suggestions of the referees and the manuscript was finally published in a minor journal [111,112]. The rejection of Pauling’s papers was strange since the readers of JAMA were effectively prevented from seeing the other side of an important controversy. There were also other problems that were not pointed out by Pauling; see [1,70].

Although the three papers have serious biases, they have been used singly or in the combinations of two as references in nutritional recommendations, in medical textbooks, in texts on infectious diseases and on nutrition, when the authors claimed that vitamin C had been shown to be ineffective for colds [1] (pp. 21–23, 36–38, 42–45). The American Medical Association, for example, officially stated that “One of the most widely misused vitamins is ascorbic acid. There is no reliable evidence that large doses of ascorbic acid prevent colds or shorten their duration” [113], a statement that was based entirely on Chalmers’s 1975 review.

These three papers are the most manifest explanation for the collapse in the interest in vitamin C and the common cold after 1975, despite the strong evidence that had emerged by that time that ≥2 g/day vitamin C shortens and alleviates colds [70].

Done reading? In short, the few limited (yet highly influential) papers who proclaimed the ineffectiveness of vitamin C were ironically significantly more biased than the ones which they attempted to debunk. Actually, they did quite a bit more than 'attempting' to debunk the merits of vitamin C, since a lot of that crap slipped through and was taught to medical students/professionals for decades. Only today, the truth finally resurfaces and vitamin C is at last considered a lot more objectively.

Let's now address the myth that a high dose of vitamin C isn't utilized by the body and is instantly expelled through urine. Compare the respective effects of a 5g and 20g dose of ascorbic acid on blood plasma:



[url=https://www.livonlabs.com/proof/Dr_Hickey_Clinical_Study_Published.pdf]Source: https://www.livonlabs.com/proof/Dr_Hickey_Clinical_Study_Published.pdf

Quote by ]In summary, we provide novel data demonstrating the spread of vitamin D concentrations in a large group of UK-based athletes tested in the winter months and report that 62% of our cohort could be described as vitamin D deficient. Our preliminary study suggests that 5000 IU per day of vitamin D3 supplementation for 8-weeks was associated with improved musculoskeletal performance as demonstrated through significant increases in vertical jump height, 10 m sprint times and a trend for improved bench press and back squat 1-RM.

Quote by [url=https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/57da/cfbf71edfbb74b161c744027389bc65a52cf.pdf
Muscular effects of vitamin D in young athletes and non-athletes and in the elderly]Vitamin D affects the diameter and number of type II, or fast twitch, muscle cells, and in particular that of type IIA cells. In severe vitamin D deficiency, proximal myopathy is observed characterized by type IIA cell atrophy. Vitamin D supplementation in young males increases the percentage of type IIA fibers in muscles, causing an increase in muscular high power output. Vitamin D-mediated induction of muscle protein synthesis and myogenesis results in muscles of higher quality and quantity, which is translated into increased muscle strength since there is a linear association between muscle mass and strength. Hypertrophy of type IIB muscle fibers results in enhanced neuromuscular performance. These types of fibers are major determinants of the explosive type of human strength that results in high power output.

Quote by [url=https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article/94/2/559/2598360
Vitamin D Status and Muscle Function in Post-Menarchal Adolescent Girls[/url]]We have used a novel outcome measure of JM to investigate how skeletal muscle function in the lower limb is affected by vitamin D and PTH status. Our data demonstrate that in a group of asymptomatic post-menarchal adolescents, serum 25(OH)D was positively related to muscle power, force, velocity, and jump height; PTH had a lesser effect upon muscle parameters. We have also confirmed the observations that there is an interdependence of muscle function (force and power) with anthropometric parameters; in our data this was predominantly weight (13, 17). Therefore, these data suggest that muscle contractility is affected by the girl’s vitamin D status, those with low-serum 25(OH)D concentration generated less power, and so jump height and velocity were lower than those with higher concentrations of 25(OH)D.

Quote by CuriousMonkey80
1. Realisticly speaking how common is 7 inches or 8 inches ?

Quote by SereneProdigy
And since I work in an engineering office which mostly favors a business-casual style (ie. definitely not as strict/formal as what I expressed in my first few paragraphs above), I also have a few green dress shirts that I like to wear with a sport coat (with or without a tie, though I often go without not to make my unstylish colleagues overly jealous). I have a few that are unicolor, but also a few plaid ones similar to what's shown below. The one on the right would look great with a gray suit I believe, or with gray pants and a black sport coat to keep things even more casual: