Gazette-Times reporter

Maret Traber, professor of nutrition in the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University, can't understand why the scientists behind a new study on the impact of vitamin E on women's health are claiming it has no impact on reducing cardiovascular disease in women.

In fact, Traber said, the study actually reveals that in women over 65 vitamin E was shown to reduce cardiovascular death by 49 percent, as well as decreasing heart attacks by 34 percent. Since women usually don't develop heart disease until their 60s, this reduction is significant, she said.

"What is mind-boggling is if this was a brand new drug (with the same results) we'd see huge headlines," she said.

The Women's Health Study included almost 40,000 women, most of them under age 65, and looked at both vitamin E and aspirin use and their effectiveness on heart disease and cancer. Researchers concluded that vitamin E does almost nothing to prevent heart disease in women.

Traber has a long history studying the effects of vitamin E, including authoring more than 100 articles on the subject and serving on scientific panels addressing Vitamin E's benefits. She said research has already shown how Vitamin E benefits cardiovascular health by preventing lipid oxidation and reducing oxidative stress.

In a study Traber directed at OSU, researchers gave marathon runners vitamin E supplements before they participated in the McDonald Forest ultra-marathon, and found that women who took vitamin E had no increase in their oxidated stress, while women who took a placebo doubled the amount of their oxidated stress, which can ultimately lead to heart disease.

Less than 2 percent of women get the recommended daily allowance of Vitamin E, Traber said, mostly because Vitamin E is found in fatty foods, which women are reducing as part of a healthier diet. Vitamin E is also found in leafy green vegetables, wheat germ oil, almonds and sunflower seeds, but most people don't eat enough of those items to get even the lowest recommended daily allowance.

Younger women face a much lower risk of cardiovascular disease, but Traber worries if they follow the advice of researchers and not routinely take Vitamin E supplements, the impact will show up when they are older women.

"Over time they're going to be more susceptible (to cardiovascular disease)," she said.

Women who took part in the Women's Health study took 600 IUs (international units) of Vitamin E every other day for 10 years. They showed no discernible adverse effects from taking the supplements other than an increase in nosebleeds, brought about because Vitamin E makes platelets less sticky, and decreases the blood's ability to clot.

The fact that there are no real health risks to taking Vitamin E, based on these findings, makes it even more baffling to Traber that the same researchers are recommending women don't take supplements.

"The authors of the study are being quite conservative" in their discussion of the findings, Traber said. "In some sense they're misleading the public."