Cheap Vitamins etc?

bylromarha

Hi Ted

thanks for all the above. Have contacted ZIPVIT and they say none of their products are suitable for under 3's. It could be H+S gone mad, but I don't know what other ingredients they put in the products, so not going to risk it.

Boots fish oil analysis is as follows.

per 2.5ml

Tuna oil 1150mg
EPA 68.7mg
DHA 275mg

£5.99 for 200ml bottles.

Is this enough EPA do you think?

There must be some company out there that will sell to under 3's...especially when reading your post it shows that these supplements have the best effects when taken at an early age.

Thanks again for your help:A

Ted_Hutchinson

For an under 5 it's more important to increase the proportion of DHA so the Boots will be fine, particularly if you are ensuring sufficient sources in the diet which will enable whichever omega 3 it needed to be metabolised.

I will have a look for other suppliers for fish oil for under 3's but I suspect you are right that it's an overcautious H&S recommendation to protect from any potential lawsuits.


These are made by Equazen who make EyeQ which was used in the Durham trial.
MUMOMEGA Infancy Capsules SIZE: 30 PRICE: £ 9.99


[font=Arial, Helvetica, Garamond] Per daily intake (1 x 250mg capsule)

Docosahexaenoic Acid ( DHA ) 100mg
Eicosapentaenoic Acid (EPA) 14mg
Arachidonic Acid (AA) 2.8mg
Docosapentaenoic Acid (DPA) 2.8mg
Gamma Linolenic Acid (GLA) 5mg
Vitamin E 1.4mg (14% RDA*)
[/font]
A lot more expensive than the Boots version and not so good IMHO.
[size=-1]Einstein DHA x 90 - Higher Nature [/size]£17.86
[size=-1]Three capsules typically provide:Omega 3 fatty acid oil from Tuna, DHA 255mg, EPA 60mg. Total Omega 3 fatty acids 315mg. Vitamin E 0.63iU.
[/size][size=-1]
As these suggest one or two capsules a day for under3's and each capsule has less active ingredient Boots still have my vote.
[/size] As mentioned in on 26/06/05
MorDHA-Mini (From 6 months up to the age of 5) -£13.99 60
has been developed to support growth, and brain development in children through the crucial first years of life and comes in a tasty strawberry flavour.
Most mums know whats best for their children but the growing amount of scientific research proves how important DHA is to a childs healthy development. From 6 months up to five years old, MorDHA-Mini is probably the most important supplement you can give them.
more information 20p capsule compared with Boots [size=+1]7.5p
[/size]

bylromarha

You're a star! Have one on me. :beer:

Gingham_Ribbon

I've been looking into this too. The boots one for toddlers is a 200ml bottle. The recommended dose is half a spoonful. The jar should be discarded after I think 6 weeks. Meaning you have to throw half the jar away each time if you only have one child taking it. Bigger jars would be even worse I suppose unless you could find one that was longer lasting but then it might be full of harmful additives?

I phoned Boots about this and although the girl was helpful, she couldn't recommend a solution. Perhaps they should sell it in smaller, cheaper bottles.

Sorry, I don't know about the capsules as my son is too young for them. I guess they would keep longer?

Ted_Hutchinson

Gingham_Ribbon wrote:

I've been looking into this too. The boots one for toddlers is a 200ml bottle. The recommended dose is half a spoonful. The jar should be discarded after I think 6 weeks. Meaning you have to throw half the jar away each time if you only have one child taking it.

In thread Omega Fish Oils I've been listing the most recent research detailing the benefits of Omega3's as a preventative and therapy for various conditions. If towards the end of the bottle you give yourself a daily teaspoon of this you won't have to waste it and you will benefit yourself. I accept that EPA 68.7mg DHA 275mg with a higher DHA than EPA is ideal for the developing brain and ensures the building blocks for the structural material of the infants brain are readily available but that doesn't mean this isn't also beneficial for the adult brain/body/blood etc. If towards week 5 in your toddler's fish oil use you help finish it off rather than taking your own adult fish oil capsule it won't make a big difference. However both you and your toddler should be regarding supplements as supplements and not alternative to eating omega in your diet
How can I get more omega 3 fatty acids in my daily meals?: question
Ideally you as an adult should be aiming for up to 4 gm of omega oils a day so helping your infant finish off the bottle before it possibly goes off, will do you no harm at all and may well encourage you to pay more attention to your own omega intake.
(PS, If you keep the bottle in the fridge and replace it immediately you've got your 1/2teaspoonful you should find it lasts longer than stated on the label, I use Omega Juice and have never had a problem with it tasting rancid after six weeks)

Gingham_Ribbon

I agree that is sound advice but I'm vegetarian and will be getting some flax seed oil for myself. Perhaps my husband will be interested in taking it though. My son is also vegetarian but as he has no choice yet I feel that it would be easier to give him the flavoured fish oil than expect him to take larger amounts of, let's face it, fairly unappetising bland oil! When he's older and he knows where meat comes from, he can either choose to eat meat or fish occasionally with daddy or take the flax oil with mummy. :-)

As I've only recently stopped breast feeding this has only now become an issue because he was getting enough omega 3 from his milk and other things he eats.

Ted_Hutchinson

I think this is a sensible compromise. But I do think that you might be better adding ground linseed to your diet in preference to the oil. Not only would you be adding beneficial fibre but also beneficial Lignans. It only takes a few seconds to whizz some natural brown linseed through a grinder/blender and pop it in a container to keep in the fridge for a week. (A 5kg bag of linseed from SUMA costs about £5.35 and keeps for some months whole but does deteriorate when ground so I only grind a weeks worth at a time). Adding a tablespoon of this to your cereal/yoghurt/casserole is a really good way of adding extra omega although I'm sure you are aware the active ingredient of linseed ALA has to be metabolised into EPA/DHA so this isn't such a direct or efficient process as using fish oil.
One-quarter cup (4 tablespoons) of flaxseeds contains about 7 grams of omega 3 fatty acids so a couple of tablespoons should get you nearly to your target.

Gingham_Ribbon

I've never heard of Lignans! It's not often one slips past me like that! I've been veggie since I was 16 and was very underweight as I was eating the wrong things. So I read up and sorted my diet out and gained the weight I needed. And unfortunately quite a bit more than I needed!

The extra fibre in the linseed isn't something I need as I eat whole grains and lots of fruit and veg but maybe this other thing would be useful. I'll check it out. I tried ground linseed when I was pregnant and it made me sick, but then everything did so it's worth giving it another go!

I also noticed that the vegetarian society recommends cutting back on food high in omega 6 as it can hinder the absorption of omega 3 from plant sources. I think that's what it said... Anyway, I'm sticking to my sunflower oil marg because I love it but I may fry more in olive oil instead.

Thanks for being so helpful.

Ted_Hutchinson

Pubmed.....It has already been shown that soya beans, with their ingredients genistein and daidzein from the isoflavonoid group, have protective effects on hormone-caused diseases. Lignans are another, less investigated, group of phytoestrogens............
Flax-seed seems to have similar inhibitory effects to soya on hormone production and proliferation of hormone-sensitive tumour cells......
The lignans are not present in the oil, they usually get filtered out, (I think some of the more expensive brands retain lignans,) but they would be there if you ate ground linseed. Obviously you wouldn't notice any extra benefit from insoluble fibre from the Linseed having already a high fibre diet but on the other hand you wouldn't notice any detrimental effect either and the extra phytoestrogens might be handy. It's quite tasty/nutty with yoghurt, or you can make a roast seed nut mix by putting them together with sesame, almonds/ walnuts or whatever, in a frying pan and slow dry roast them on the hob then quick whizz in the processor. Sprinkle on crumbles or cakes/ biscuits cereals etc or add to yog or ice cream.
It's generally better nutritionally if you consume the least processed foods, and oil is more highly processed than natural linseed. I expect the flaxseed works out cheaper too if you buy it in bulk like I do.

Ted_Hutchinson

Gingham_Ribbon wrote:

I am so interested is I have recently discovered that my asthma is linked strongly to my hormones and I can actually breathe better mid cycle.

Dietary phytoestrogens have anti-inflammatory activity in a guinea pig model of asthma.Interesting not something I've heard of before but worth a try.

Edit: I've seen your comment below. The above link does provide a further link to the actual research paper which gives more information. Not sure I understand it all but in the modest levels of phytoestrogens you are likely to get from a couple of tablespoons of Linseed it's unlikely that any adverse effects would appear. It's also the case that there is a big difference between refining the food source so that the active ingredients are presented in a concentrated form as soy extract containing the isoflavones genistin and daidzin is the same as eating soy (or linseed) in their usual manner.