Vitamin B1 (Thiamin)

What Is It?

As the first B Vitamin to be discovered, thiamin can rightly claim the name of vitamin B1. This nutrient is essential to normal growth and development. It participates in converting the carbohydrates from foods into energy and promotes proper functioning of the heart and nervous systems.

There are still groups at risk of developing a thiamin deficiency: older adults and alcoholics in particular. There are also certain ailments for which extra thiamin can be beneficial. For example, thiamin supplements may help to guard against a thiamin deficiency caused by taking diuretics, a standard treatment for congestive heart failure. Thiamin may lessen numbness and tingling in individuals with diabetes and other disorders that can cause nerve damage. Thiamin has shown promise in treating a number of other disorders, including depression, anxiety, and stress.

Because it works synergistically with other B vitamins, it's best to get thiamin as part of a B-complex supplement rather than on its own.

Whole Health MD

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Health Benefits

Anti-Stress Vitamin And Immune System Enhancer

Similar to some other B complex vitamins, thiamine is considered an "anti-stress" vitamin because it is believed to enhance the activity of the immune system and improve the body's ability to withstand stressful conditions.

University of Maryland Medical Center

Heart failure

Thiamine may be related to heart failure in two ways. First, low levels of thiamine may contribute to the development of congestive heart failure (CHF). On the flip side, people with severe heart failure can lose a significant amount of weight including muscle mass (called wasting or cachexia) and become deficient in many nutrients. It is not known whether taking thiamine supplements would have any bearing on the development or progression of CHF and cachexia. Eating a balanced diet, including thiamine, and avoiding things that deplete this nutrient, such as high amounts of sugar and alcohol, seems prudent, particularly for those at the early stages of CHF.

University of Maryland Medical Center

A third of patients hospitalized with congestive heart failure are deficient in vitamin B1

A study published in the January 17, 2006, issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology reported that approximately one out of three patients hospitalized with heart failure have deficient levels of thiamin, also known as vitamin B1. According to the authors of the report, a deficiency of thiamin manifests as heart failure symptoms and may worsen pre-existing disease. The study is the largest to date of thiamin deficiency among individuals hospitalized with heart failure.

Mary E. Keith, PhD of St Michael's Hospital in Toronto, Ontario, and colleagues at St Michael's and the University of Toronto, measured thiamin levels among 100 heart failure patients and compared them with those of 50 healthy subjects. They found a deficiency of the vitamin in 33 percent of the heart failure patients compared to 12 percent of those without the disease. Dr Keith commented, "We found that one-third of congestive heart failure patients admitted to our hospital had red blood cell levels of thiamin that were lower than normal and would suggest deficiency. In contrast to some previous studies, we did not find a relationship between the development of thiamin deficiency and the amount or duration of diuretic use and urinary thiamin excretion. In fact, what was important was that a relatively small dose of thiamin from a multivitamin was protective against developing thiamin deficiency."

Dr. Keith observed that heart failure may increase the body's need for certain nutrients, so that even individuals with healthful diets may still come up short on vitamin B1. "Physicians and the public have exclusively focused on drug therapy to the detriment of at least one of the foundations of good health-appropriate nutrition," she added.

—D Dye 

Life Extension Foundation