BACKGROUND Dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR) converts dihydrofolate (DHF) into tetrahydrofolate (THF) and plays an essential role in cell metabolism and cellular growth. Folic acid from multivitamins needs to be reduced by DHFR before it participates in cellular reactions. OBJECTIVES We examined the relation of a 19-base pair (bp) deletion polymorphism of the DHFR gene with the risk of breast ca...

A nine years old boy presented with history of pallor and anaemia since early infancy along with neural hearing loss responding to empirical multivitamin and folic acid therapy started on basis of blood complete picture showing anaemia and megaloblastic anaemia. On investigation he was diagnosed with Thiamine Responsive Megaloblastic Anaemia, a very rare condition in our settings.

OBJECTIVE To study the effect of periconceptional multivitamin supplementation on neural tube defects and other congenital abnormality entities. DESIGN Randomised controlled trial of supplementation with multivitamins and trace elements. SETTING Hungarian family planning programme. SUBJECTS 4156 pregnancies with known outcome and 3713 infants evaluated in the eighth month of life. INTER...

OBJECTIVE To investigate the effect of supplementation with multivitamin and mineral on blood pressure and C-reactive protein (CRP) in obese women with increased cardiovascular disease risk as having hypertension, hyperglycemia or hyperlipemia. SUBJECTS AND METHODS 128 obese Chinese women aged 18-55 years with increased cardiovascular disease risk participated in a 26-week randomized, double-...

BACKGROUND Dietary supplements are widely used by cancer survivors. However, health effects among older cancer survivors are unclear. METHODS We used the Iowa Women's Health Study, a prospective cohort study with 2,118 postmenopausal women with a confirmed cancer diagnosis (1986-2002), to evaluate the association between postdiagnosis dietary supplement use assessed in 2004 and subsequent all...

BACKGROUND Complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) use, including herbals and multivitamin supplements, is quite common in the U.S., and has been shown to be highest in breast cancer survivors. However, limited data are currently available for CAM usage among African Americans. Thus, we sought to determine the prevalence of multivitamins, folic acid and herbal supplement usage in African A...

BACKGROUND The pattern of weight gain during pregnancy among HIV-infected women is largely unknown. Multivitamin supplementation was shown to be effective in preventing adverse pregnancy outcomes among HIV-positive women. These protective effects could be mediated in part by an improvement in the pattern of gestational weight gain. OBJECTIVE We examined the effects of multivitamin and vitamin...

BACKGROUND Folate-associated one-carbon metabolism (FOCM) may play an important role in colorectal carcinogenesis. Variation in FOCM genes may explain some of the underlying risk of colorectal cancer. METHODS This study utilized data from 1,805 population-based colorectal cancer cases and 2,878 matched sibling controls from the Colon Cancer Family Registry. We used a comprehensive haplotype t...

BACKGROUND Use of multivitamin supplements during the pre-HAART era has been found to reduce viral load, enhance immune response, and generally improve clinical outcomes among HIV-infected adults. However, immune reconstitution is incomplete and significant mortality and opportunistic infections occur in spite of HAART. There is insufficient research information on whether multivitamin suppleme...