Taking Multivitamins May Protect Men from Cancer

If your man is too busy to go for a jog or to even eat a healthy meal, it’s important that at the very least, he takes supplemental vitamins. Not only would these give him the nutrients he needs on a daily basis, they might just also protect him from the Big C.

MedicalNewsToday.com reports that the habit of drinking vitamins may have a shielding effect against certain kinds of cancer. As there have been many conflicting studies about the issue, Harvard Medical School researcher J. Michael Gaziano, M.D., M.P.H. and his team examined data from the Physicians' Health Study II (PHS II), a randomized trial involving 14,641 male doctors with an average age of 50 years.  

The participants were separated into two groups: the multivitamin group which took a supplement daily and the placebo group which took a substitute that looked and tasted like a multivitamin. The observation started in 1997, and continued until the first of June in 2011.

Gaziano and his team found that those who took multivitamins had an eight percent lower risk of developing cancer than those who only took the placebo. Multivitamins, however, didn’t have any major effect on prostate cancer.

Although Gaziano’s work still needs further research and while it’s currently difficult to pinpoint which vitamins or minerals contribute to cancer protection, this study is good news for the men in our lives. But that doesn’t mean that all their health problems can be covered by taking supplements; a proper diet and regular exercise, as well as cutting back on bad habits such a smoking and drinking too much, can help keep their immune systems strong and their bodies in tip-top shape.


(Photo by Bradley Stemke via Flickr Creative Commons)