Now that we are completely c
onfused about the risk/rewards of PSA tests, it’s reassuring, in a strange way, to read something about prostate cancer that is definitive, kind of. The Wall Street Journal reports that researchers hoping to find that vitamin E would reduce the risk of prostate cancer actually learned that, oops, it jacked up the risk, approximately 17 percent. The research began with an earlier study of the benefits, if any, of vitamin E, selenium, or a combination of the two, a study that was halted three years ago when it became clear that there was nothing to gain. In a follow up study however, one involving half of the original study’s 35,000 men, vitamin E did appear to influence prostate cancer, in a bad way. The researchers found that for every 1,000 men, 76 who took vitamin E supplements got prostate cancer, compared with 65 men who took a placebo. The bad news comes on the heels of another study of the influence of vitamins, suggesting that women who take many vitamins have a greater risk of death than women who don’t. Read an abstract of the vitamin E study in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
65 out of 35,000 who did not take E got prostrate cancer. 76 who did take E got prostrate cancer. Dose not sound real difinitive to me. Surley not enough to outweigh the other benefits of vitamin E. As to the last statement about women who take vitamins having a greater risk of death than those who don’t; well think about it this way. We all have a 100% chance of death. Does not matter if we take vitamins or not.