Vitamin B12 belongs to the B Vitamin group and plays an essential role heart health. A deficiency in Vitamin B12 can lead to elevated homocysteine levels in your body; an independent risk for heart disease. There is no one single cause of heart disease, but there are certainly risk factors that increase your chance of developing heart disease, and elevated homocysteine is one of those risks. The good news is that you can do something about it.

Hazardous homocysteine

Like so many other risk factors related to heart disease, the effects of elevated homocysteine levels can’t be seen or felt; there are no obvious outward symptoms. Instead, elevated homocysteine levels stealthily create havoc in your cardiovascular system through a number of means:

• Changes your blood clotting factor levels, promoting blood clot formation
• Prevents your small arteries from dilating, increasing the risk of blockages
• Works together with LDL or ‘bad’ cholesterol to damage the inner lining of your blood vessels; an early development of hardening and narrowing of your arteries
• Promotes platelet aggregation where your blood becomes ‘sticky’ and begins to clump together

Increased levels of homocysteine have also been implicated in many other health conditions including neural tube defects, type 2 diabetes, complications of diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and osteoporosis.

Are you at risk of Vitamin B12 deficiency?

A Vitamin B12 deficiency can occur for a number of reasons. A primary deficiency is associated with:

• strict vegetarians
• vegans
• breastfed babies of vegetarian/vegan mothers
• the elderly (thought to be as high as 34% due to low levels of stomach acid) or
• those with a chronic alcohol problem

A secondary deficiency is associated with

• poor dietary absorption
• defects in the vitamin B12 metabolic pathways
• gastrointestinal disorders
• poor dietary intake or
• even through interactions with medications

Vitamin B12 obtained from food sources or oral tablets needs to interact with stomach acid and a protein called intrinsic factor (IF) to become active in your body. Those taking proton pump inhibitors to reduce stomach acid levels will also adversely affect IF production, leading to a deficiency. A sublingual form vitamin B12 by-passes the requirement for IF, by being absorbed under the tongue instead.

Vitamin B12 and the Vitamin B6 and Folic Acid link

The chemical changes needed to break down homocysteine require not only vitamin B12, but also Folic Acid and Vitamin B6. A fault in either of these two metabolic pathways leads to increased homocysteine levels. Insufficient dietary intake of Vitamin B6 and Folic Acid also increase your risk of elevated homocysteine levels. Vitamin B6 is essential in the process of metabolising and converting homocysteine into cysteine, while Folic Acid is essential in the process of metabolising and converting homocysteine back into methionine. Heart disease is largely preventable for many Australians. Vitamin B12 can be used alone where there is a suspected deficiency or in combination with vitamin B6 and Folic Acid to help reduce elevated homocysteine levels as a preventative approach to reduce your overall risk of heart disease.

Mr Vitamin recommends

Herbs of Gold Supplements for a Healthy Heart

• Sublingual B12 1000 and 
• Folic Acid Complex

Find our more about Herbs of Gold Supplements for a Healthy Heart here