Zinc supplementation does not alter plasma homocysteine, vitamin B12 and red blood cell folate concentrations in French elderly subjects.

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc and Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B12), published as a randomized controlled trial.

Zinc is involved in the folates and vitamin B12 metabolism with opposite actions.

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of zinc supplementation on homocysteine and vitamin B12 plasma levels as well as red blood cell folate level in French ageing subjects participating in the ZENITH study.

Who Took Part

The age groups tagged for this paper are middle-aged adults and older adults, both men and women.

Apparently healthy middle-aged (55-70 years) and free-living older (70-85 years) subjects were enrolled.

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized study.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

What Was Measured

PubMed files the paper under topics including Age Factors, Dietary Supplements, Erythrocytes, Folic Acid, France, Homocysteine and Vitamin B 12.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized study of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc and Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B12).

Results are reported in around 5 sentences of the abstract; we leave them to the paper itself rather than summarise them.

The publication is from 2009 (Journal of trace elements in medicine and biology : organ of the Society for Minerals and Trace Elements (GMS)), a journal based in Germany.

More context: the Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc compound page and the Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B12) compound page, all human trials.