REPORT ON HIGH-DOSE VITAMIN E SUPPLEMENTS NAMED ONE OF “HOT PAPERS” OF 2005

Johns Hopkins Medicine
Media Relations and Public Affairs
Media contact: David March
410-955-1534; [email protected]
April 4, 2006

REPORT ON HIGH-DOSE VITAMIN E SUPPLEMENTS NAMED ONE OF “HOT PAPERS” OF 2005

The medical newsletter Science Watch has ranked a vitamin E study by Johns Hopkins researchers on its annual list of 40 “hot” scientific papers.

For 2005, the Hopkins analysis of vitamin E’s risks and benefits, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, was the eighth most frequently cited paper in the scientific literature.

The study, which carefully interpreted results of 19 previous studies, showed that high-dose vitamin E supplements, in excess of 400 IU (international units) consumed daily, were associated with a 4 percent to 6 percent increased risk of dying, and it received international attention. 

In its analysis, Science Watch noted the Hopkins paper had been cited 73 times within the first year of its being published, making it a clear winner in its Red-Hot Research Papers in the United States’ issue.

“This is wonderful honor and a timely reminder of the flawed reasoning behind the widespread use of some vitamin supplements,” says senior author Eliseo Guallar, M.D., Dr.P.H., an associate professor of epidemiology at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and the University's Bloomberg School of Public Health.  “Our conclusions were made by pulling together all relevant information.  Sometimes, analysis of a large body of existing data can be much greater than the sum of its parts.”  The study was led by internist Edgar R. Miller III, M.D., Ph.D., an associate professor of medicine at Hopkins, and fellow internist Lawrence Appel, M.D., M.P.H., also a professor at Hopkins.

- JHM -