How good are the vitamins you take?

We are in the midst of cold and flu season and it is difficult to avoid the viruses that make us sick during these chilly months. The good news is that your body came equipped with an army to fight off these viruses; it is called your immune system.

Most of you have probably heard to take vitamin C when you feel under the weather, but there are many other important vitamins that your immune system needs in order to fight off the viruses that make you sick. It is essential that you take a multivitamin, but not just any multivitamin. Not all vitamins are created equal; it depends on the form of the vitamin or the carrier molecule of the mineral.

Here are a few tricks to make sure you have a high quality multivitamin to help you get through the cold and flu season. Vitamin E can exist in natural form (d-alpha tocopherol) or a synthetic form (dl-alpha tocopherol). Look for the natural form. Calcium carbonate is found in many inexpensive supplements and is much more difficult to absorb compared to highly absorbable calcium citrate or calcium aspartate. Calcium, magnesium, potassium, and sodium are minerals that take up a lot of space in a multivitamin and require more pills per day to get the required amounts. Multivitamins that are advertised at one to two pills per day do not have required amounts of these large minerals. It is often difficult to find high quality vitamins in stores because many are available only to health care practitioners.

Use these tricks or contact a health care practitioner in your area the next time you want to challenge a cold or flu virus.