How effective is Vitamin E?

[Thinker]

I've been doing some research around the internet and on the effectiveness of vitamin E, so far I've been seeing mixed results on whether it helps with people's penile problems or not. but I would like to here any opinions around the forum since I'm considering taking it, also how much is the recommend intake?

[Lucketts]

Kenji,

Vitamin E tends to be the vitamin of first recourse for urologists who know little about peyronies.  To my knowledge there is no documented evidence that it helps in any way.  I remember reading a few studies that sustained use of Vitamin E may not be good for the heart.  If that is all your urologist is suggesting, might want to go to another one.

   

[rich68]

Here's an article which found an improvement with vitamin E when combined with other antioxidants and Verapamil:
Effectiveness of antioxidants (propolis, blueberry, vitamin E) associated with verapamil in the medical management of Peyronie's disease: a study o... - PubMed - NCBI
(see the link to the full text)

They were using 600mg of vitamin E which I think is equal to 400 iu.

I have also read about negative effects from vitamin E but I think 400 iu is just about OK from what I've previously read. The above article suggests the safe limit is much higher.

[LWillisjr]

There was a study done years ago with Vitamin E alone. It had a very small sample of participants. But this study seems to be the one that the textbooks and is why a lot of urologist recommend Vit E. But since this time it seems to have little effect and I know of know one who benefited from Vit E alone.

Verapamil has been used for several years now, and while it is not a miracle drug. About 30% of patients see some improvement with it.

From the study you posted doesn't prove anything to me for Vitamin. If you read the abstract, Vitamin E was COMBINED with Verapami linjections + topical diclonefac in all test groups. So why would I assume that Vitamin E had little if anything to do with the results.

[Lucketts]

400 iu daily is considered a high dosage, and was linked to increased heart hospitalizations and heart failure after several years.  Probably wouldn't hurt for a short period of time, but I wouldn't stay on it too long.  Plus, as was pointed it, it did some good --but only when combined w/ a bunch of other treatments.

[kuaka]

Interesting.  I have a scrip for Diclofenac in pill form.  I may take it daily instead of just when my knees hurt for a while and see if it seems to help.

[rich68]

The study I mentioned did not use vitamin E in group 5:

"However, the unsatisfactory results related to group 5 (without vitamin E) in many categories of results show that vitamin E probably plays a significant role in the treatment of Peyronie's disease (contrary to what is reported by Hauck and other authors) especially if combined with other active drugs."

Regarding heart failure, I did find the following which supports exactly what Lucketts is saying:
Vitamin E Harms More Than It Helps

A more recent 10 year study (but only 600 IU every other day) found no risk of heart failure in women:
Vitamin E supplementation and the risk of heart failure in women. - PubMed - NCBI

I found a lot of recent research papers mentioning cardiovascular benefits from vitamin E. However, I think they are merely requoting old research (which may be flawed).

I'm not taking vitamin E myself currently. I am inclined to take the advice of members on here, many have presumably tried it and reported no benefit.

With diclofenac, keep an eye out for any signs of internal bleeding, stomach pain etc. Some people are sensitive to it.

[james1947]

rich68

Vitamin E may be good for many things but will not help with Peyronies.
Quote from George999, he is very knowledgeable in those subjects:

I would not get too excited over the fact that Vitamin E is a blood thinner.  The way Vitamin E thins the blood is by blocking Vitamin K1, and that is NOT a good thing.  Anyone supplementing with Vitamin E should be also supplementing with Vitamin K1.  Blocking Vitamin K1 only reduces clotting, it does not improve circulation like Pentox does.  But Vitamin E IS an anti-oxidant in its own right and that is probably where its benefit in treating Peyronie's lies.  But remember that Vitamin E in the common form of alpha-tocopherol only controls reactive oxygen species.  It actually creates more problems with reactive nitrogen species which is just as dangerous.  The solution is to include the gamma-tocopherol form which controls reactive nitrogen species balancing out the alpha-tocopherol component.

Tried to make a search for Vitamin E on the forum but the search is not accepting single letters like E for example and a search for vitamins returns 30 pages

James

[rich68]

Very interesting, thanks James!

By the way, you can search "vitamin e" with the quotation marks but you still get 23 pages of results. I might go through them when I have some time.

[james1947]

I was not spending my time just to read about vitamin E

James