Vitamins have been crucial to maintaining our health. They play a major role in keeping life 'alive' in a human body. Vitamin deficiencies are notorious for their harmful affects to every age group of humans. Two commonly known vitamins have made their way into news these days wrt., elderly people and their health. Vitamin D and E are making headlines in medical research too.
 

A very recent study found that vitamin D deficiency might cause weakness and cause elderly people to trip frequently. Vitamin D supplementation can reduce the risk of falling in this age group. The study had a vitamin D supplement or a placebo delivered to 68 people. Their health was monitored through blood tests and their history of falls was recorded and measured. The tests revealed that the people taking vitamin D supplements fell less than half the number of times people who ddn't take any vitamin D supplements fell.

A five year study was conducted on 561 Alzheimer's patients. They were offered a pharmaceutical drug memantine and the placebo. Those who took vitamin E had a reduced progression of Alzheimer's in comparison with both a placebo group and the memantine group. This was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association that vitamin E supplementation may reduce the progression of Alzheimer's. However, few opinions on usage of multivitamins that made news these days. They say vitamin capsules and tablets are not so effective, few say they are helpful. What do you believe? I say, its better to consume vegetables and fruits rich in every vitamin and mineral, and utilise sunlight for its rich vitamin D ability. Isn't it safer ?

--Pratyusha