If you feel nauseous after taking multivitamins, you’re not alone.
We asked Anastasiya Shor, PharmD, an assistant professor of pharmacy practice at the Touro College of Pharmacy in New York City, why multivitamins can cause nausea and how to avoid it.
Q: Why can multivitamins cause stomach upset, such as nausea?
Shor: It could be your empty stomach that’s causing the nausea, especially if you are taking them in the morning before you’ve had breakfast.
Big points for being diligent about your health by taking the vitamins, but vitamins are very concentrated. Without some food—even just a couple of crackers—to coat your stomach and dilute them, the vitamins can irritate the lining and cause discomfort, nausea, and even diarrhea.
Fat-soluble vitamins like A, D, E, and K are stored in the body’s liver and fatty tissues to be used over time. But if you’re not priming your stomach for fat digestion, they can cause nausea. So it’s important to take them with food, which slows the absorption and disperses the vitamins.
Q: What other tips can help someone taking multivitamins avoid stomach upset?
Shor: Try taking the vitamins at night with your dinner, when your stomach has had a full day’s food supply. That reduces the chance of stomach upset and nausea. If you take several vitamins separately, consider taking some with breakfast and others with dinner to limit stomach upset and improve absorption.
If you exercise in the morning, wait until after your workout to take vitamins. Stretching and movement create stomach acid, and if you have the vitamins beforehand, you may feel some nausea, heartburn, or reflux. If those are already symptoms you experience, taking the multivitamin beforehand can make it worse.
Tablets can be hard to digest for some people because of the binding agent that holds the ingredients together. Gummy vitamins and versions that are dissolvable or chewable may be easier on your stomach. Take some time in the pharmacy vitamin aisle to look at your options and ask the pharmacist for help choosing the vitamins least upsetting to your stomach.
Lastly, talk to a dietitian about your diet. It could be that you are getting, or could get, all the nutrients you need through food. Vitamins are concentrated forms of the nutrients you need, while food has smaller but sufficient amounts dispersed over the different foods in the meal. Especially if you find that taking vitamins leads to stomach upset, you may want to consider diet changes that may give you all the nutrients you need.
