Calcium Supplements May Cause Heart Attacks

Options
mathteacher
mathteacher Member Posts: 243
edited June 2014 in Complementary and Holistic Medicine and Treatment
New  British Medical Journal Report

Calcium Supplements May Increase Risk Of Heart Attacks

30 Jul 2010   

An international team of researchers that reviewed data from several trials found that taking calcium supplements was linked to a higher risk of heart attack and other cardiovascular events; the authors called for new research to re-assess the role of calcium supplements in the treatment of osteoporosis.

In the 29 July online issue of the BMJ you can read a report on how Dr Ian Reid, a professor of Medicine at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, and colleagues from the University of Aberdeen in the UK and Dartmouth Medical School in the US, found that people taking calcium supplements had between 27 and 31 per cent higher risk of heart attack than counterparts who took placebo.

Reid and colleagues also found smaller, but non-significant, increases in the risk of stroke and death.

Many older people take calcium supplements for osteoporosis. This is probably because research shows calcium supplements may marginally reduce the risk of fracture, and most guidelines suggest people make sure their diet contains enough calcium as a way to protect against or manage osteoporosis, wrote the researchers in their background information.

But a recent trial found calcium supplements may increase the rate of heart attack (myocardial infarction) and cardiovascular events in healthy older women, so Reid and colleagues decided to investigate further by conducting a meta-analysis (a study that pools and re-analyzes results from lots of other studies and as if they belonged to one giant study).

They searched established sources for published reports of trials that met their criteria. The trials had to be randomized, placebo-controlled trials that ran for at least one year and examined the effect of calcium supplements (dose of 500 mg per day or higher) on at least 100 participants of average age of 40 years.

They found 15 trials that matched their criteria: 5 had patient-level data covering over 8,000 participants over a median follow-up of 3.6 years, and 11 had trial-level data covering nearly 12,000 participants and a mean duration of 4 years.

For the 5 studies that yielded patient-level data, the researchers found:
  • A 31 per cent higher risk of heart attack in the people who took calcium supplements compared to those who took placebo (143 on calcium versus 111 on placebo; hazard ratio HR 1.31, 95 per cent confidence interval CI ranged from 1.02 to 1.67, statistical significance P=0.035).
  • An increase in stroke risk, but this was not significant (HR 1.20, 95% CI 0.96 to 1.50, P=0.11).
  • Non-significant increases in risk of death and a composite end-point comprising sudden death, heart attack or stroke.
For the 11 studies that yielded trial-level data, they found a similar pattern:
  • 27 per cent higher risk of heart attack in the people who took calcium supplements compared to those who took placebo (166 vs 130, pooled relative risk 1.27, 95% CI 1.01 to 1.59, P=0.038).
· Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

Comments

  • Medigal
    Medigal Member Posts: 1,412
    edited July 2010

    Oh crap!  You can't win in this disgusting game to stay alive and well!  I take just one calcium pill a day because of the other side effects I have with it and now they find it can kill me??  I think they put all the crazies in research and they love to come up with more things to frighten us with.  Tough! I beat them on this one.  I won't say how because some of you still want to keep this support group on a "happy" mode.  I am about to take my calcium killer pill now.  Wish me luck friends!

    · Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
  • Shrek4
    Shrek4 Member Posts: 1,822
    edited July 2010

    Ridiculous. They don't know anymore where to get money from.

    Anyway, talking about what to take anymore as it seems everything kills you.

    Well, simply existing kills you.

    Just live your life and do a little bit to embetter it, and that should be enough.

    · Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
  • mollyann
    mollyann Member Posts: 472
    edited July 2010

    Reposting from several months ago:

     This subject has come up big time over the last 3 years at the CAM conferences I go to with my sister's business.  I remember one case a doctor presented where a breast cancer survivor took her multivitamin plus calcium citrate in the morning, went to the gym and began feeling odd on the treadmill like a palpitation. So they called the ambulance even tho she didn't feel that bad.

    When she got to the emergency room her blood calcium was high and there was a tiny, tiny amount of some heart attack enzyme in her blood (which could have been brought on by exercise) so they told her they thought she was having a heart attack and scheduled an immediate angiogram where they thread some catheter up to your coronary arteries. Meanwhile her twelve year-old twin daughters who had just seen their mother survive breast cancer are crying, thinking mom is going to die from a heart attack.

    The CAM docs are recommending magnesium and vitamin D to keep calcium from leaving the bones. And NO CALCIUM SUPPLEMENTS. Calcium supplementation has never been proven to help osteoporis anyway although it is hyped.

    · Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
  • Jenniferz
    Jenniferz Member Posts: 541
    edited July 2010

    Oh, just peachy!! I take two a day because of osteopenia!! Plus D of course. I did have an incidence of too much calcium in my blood earlier this year, and at that time was taking 3 tablets. So, by cutting back one, supposedly I am safe. Maybe. Nothing was said that this could cause heart problems.



    Well, until I speak with my pcp again in a month or two, will stay the course I'm on until she tells me differently. Like Miedigal says, it's always something out there to kill us off!

    · Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

Categories