Saturday, December 26, 2009

Vitamin C supplements may raise cataract risk.

From Consumer Health Digest...

A study of women who were followed over an 8-year period has found that vitamin C supplementation, particularly in high dose and long duration, may increase the risk of age-related cataracts. The study included 24,593 women aged 49-83 years from the Swedish Mammography Cohort (follow-up from September 1997 to October 2005). The researchers used a self-administered questionnaire to collect information on dietary supplement use and lifestyle factors.

The study does not prove cause-and-effect, but because high-dose vitamin C provides no proven benefit for the general population, the findings provide further reason to avoid vitamin C megadosage.

[Rautiainen S and others. Vitamin C supplements and the risk of age-related cataract: a population-based prospective cohort study in women. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Nov 18, 2009. Epub ahead of print]
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19923367

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