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The Vitamin Wonderland: Exploring the Benefits of Every Essential Nutrient
- Vitamin A plays an important role in keeping the eyes healthy, growing normal bones and teeth, and gene regulating. Its deficiency, although pretty rare in developed countries, can cause night blindness, bone problems, and infections because of immunodeficiency. Vitamin A can mostly be found in egg yolks, liver, oil, meat, cheese and butter.Vitamin
- B1 helps convert food into energy, maintaining healthy skin and a healthy nervous system. Its deficiency, called beriberi, can be dry or wet. Dry beriberi can cause neuropathy which happens with nerve damage. Wet beriberi causes dilated cardiomyopathy which makes the heart chambers thin, stretch, and grow larger. It can even cause heart failure in the worst scenarios. As it’s a water-soluble vitamin that can be eliminated through urine when in excess, it’s more likely to have a B1 deficiency but less likely to have toxic amounts in your body. The main sources of vitamin B1 are eggs, meat, yeast, vegetables and nuts.
- Vitamin B2 also helps convert food into energy and keeps the blood healthy. It’s water-soluble and its deficiency is usually caused by malnutrition and sometimes by lacking dairy products and meat, especially in people who are lactose intolerant. It can be found in milk, whole grains, eggs, yeast, mushrooms and leafy green vegetables.
