If You Think it’s OK to Take Expired Vitamins – Read This First
There was a recent news story about two pregnant women who became ill from taking expired vitamin B supplements (link).
Pregnant women are among a number of “medically sensitive” groups who rely on vitamins for special health conditions, often recommended by a doctor. Others include people with illness, the elderly, and children. Not to mention the millions of us who use these products on a regular basis for general health.
This is a serious reminder of how important quality is when it comes to vitamins, or any product that we ingest. Both freshness and expiration dating areextremely important factors in ensuring that the vitamin supplements you take are safe and effective. Below are some tips to ensure that you get the freshest vitamin supplements possible.
What You Should Know About Vitamin Expiration Dates?
It’s hard to believe, but the FDA has no formal guidelines dictating expiration dates for vitamin supplements. That’s right, there are no set regulations for expiration dates on vitamin supplements. But wait a minute; if there are no guidelines, then how is the manufacturer going determine what dating to put on the product package? You guessed it! They will typically push the dates out as far as possible because extending expiration dates means that there is less of a chance that manufacturers will have to throw out expired product or issue refunds to shoppers.
This is troubling scenario that can put the consumer at risk. Let’s look at some of the risks associated with expired vitamins and then down below are some simple tips to help protect you from the dangers of expired vitamins.
Is it OK to Use Vitamins After They Expire?
Vitamins can be very expensive and nobody wants to throw them away if there is any chance you could still use them. But what many people don’t know is that vitamin supplements can change over time.
Expired Vitamin E and Vitamin D–these are both oil-based vitamins. Anything that’s oil-based can break down when exposed to oxygen. So even though the date on the label may not show expiration for a few years, once the bottle is opened, the oxygen begins to break down these vitamins.
Expired Fish Oil Supplements–as with oil-based vitamins, supplements containingomega fats from flax or fish oils can also degrade. These supplements come in higher doses and can become unstable when exposed to air, moisture, and heat. Over time, toxins like hydrogen peroxide can become present and turn the product rancid. It’s always best to refrigerate nutritional oils and use them up within 30 days of opening.
Expired multi-vitamins – we’ve all had that bottle of multivitamins that gets buried in the back of the cupboard and ends up sitting for a long time. Since multivitamins are high volume selling products, manufacturers will produce them in very large batches. When they do this, it can take months or even years for the inventory to get to retail shelves before it even reaches the consumer. Always check the dating of your multivitamin. If the date on the bottle is less than two years from the today, then it’s very likely that the product has been sitting for a number of years. Look for inconsistency in the product. For instance, there may be variation in color or in the shape of the tablet or capsule. These are subtle but important signs of age.
Five Ways to Keep Vitamin Supplements Fresh for Better Quality and Potency
It’s obvious that trying to get the freshest vitamin supplement products is something we should all do to ensure that we’re getting the cleanest, purest nutrition available. Here are some tips about what you can do to keep your vitamins fresh for maximum potency and safety.
Five things you can do to ensure that your vitamins are at peak potency and freshness
- Buy from the source (the manufacturer) – for most of us, it’s easier to buy our vitamins from the shelves of the grocery store, or mass merchandisers, or Amazon. But the problem is that these large outlets often buy inventory in huge quantities and then hold that inventory in their vast warehouses where it can sit for months or years. These days, almost every individual vitamin brand will also sell products on their own website. Buying your vitamin supplements direct from the manufacturer cuts out all of the distributors and retailers.
- Stay away from unknown online sellers/websites –a simple online search will come back with dozens of websites selling the exact sameproduct. Very often we choose based upon price. But lowest price is sometimes listed by an unauthorized seller who is trying to liquidate old dated inventory. Or worse, they could be selling counterfeit vitamin supplements being manufactured in horrible disgusting conditions. These sites pop up and shut down very regularly so if something goes wrong, it’s difficult to hold them accountable. Again, when it comes to health products and vitamin supplements specifically, it’s worth a few extra dollars to buy as close to the source as you can.
- Watch out for crazy discounts/sales – even reputable retailers can purchase too much inventory on a particular item. Once it’s been sitting in their warehouse for months (or years), they will often run unusually low discounts to flush it out. I’ve purchased vitamins at 40-50% off thinking that I was getting a great deal only to find out that the product was expired when I received it. There was no way to know this when I purchased it.
- Store your vitamin supplements in the fridge – heat, moisture, and light are the enemies of delicate nutrients. You spend a lot of money on supplements and you want to get as the maximum benefit. I recommend storing your vitamins in the refrigerator. But I don’t recommend using the crisper drawer only because those drawers typically trap humidity and ethylene gas (a natural emission from ripening fruits and veggies). I keep all of my vitamin supplements and herbs in a tray placed on the top shelf of the refrigerator.
- Use them so that they don’t sit around for months! – the most obvious but often forgotten. We just forget to take our vitamins. Try setting reminders in your phone for the same time each day. Also,by keeping your vitamin supplements on the top shelf of the refrigerator helps keep them top of mind.
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