How do vitamins in pill form differ from the vitamins we get through our diet? Our biomedical expert Erik answers one of the many questions we have received through our Q&A on social media:
- This is actually a question that should be answered separately for each of the 13 substances that we currently classify as vitamins, since many vitamins occur in several different forms in nature and therefore also in our diet.
In some cases, the forms of vitamins used in vitamin supplements will be completely identical at the molecular level to those found in food, i.e. they are exactly the same substance. In some other cases, there will be differences for various reasons. In any case, the degree to which the body can utilize a vitamin, and the way the body handles a form of a vitamin that is only found in pills, will generally be equivalent to, or better than, the form found in food. For example, Vitamin D2, which is the form found in plants and fungi, has been shown to be less potent for humans than Vitamin D3 in increasing blood levels of the active Vitamin D hormone.
In addition, D3 has been shown to be a more stable molecule in powder form and less susceptible to degradation. D3 has therefore become the obvious form to include in a supplement or to use when fortifying foods such as dairy products with vitamins. That said, D3 also occurs naturally in foods such as fatty fish and algae, so this is a typical example of what was mentioned above, where several forms exist in nature and we humans have chosen to focus on the best form specifically for dietary supplements. There is also an example that stands out in the opposite direction, where Vitamin E in a form that is only found in nature has a higher absorption rate compared with the form that we can synthesize.
Erik Lindqvist, Biomedical Expert and Product Manager, VitaMine
