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When is a vitamin not good for you?

When it's Barney and not Fred? But really, new research questions the benefits of vitamins that many of us believe keep us healthy, specifically heart health.

This will be an eye opener for many of you who take vitamins or aspirin to prevent heart attacks. The new study which enrolled more than 14,000 male physicians showed taking vitamins C or E or both every other day did not prevent heart disease.

That's contrary to lab and animal studies which showed the anti-oxidant properties of vitamins C and E did lower cardiovascular risks. Yet, in human studies neither heart attack nor stroke rates were lowered.

Believe it or not, there was actually a negative effect of taking the vitamins. Vitamin E takers had a 74% greater risk for bleeding strokes than those not taking the vitamin. And the real surprise was that vitamin C takers could face increased cancer risk, not less.

Let's remember though that the physician study involves people who generally have healthy diets and took the vitamins as supplements. This points to the concept that there can be too much of a good thing.

Another study has shown that for heart attack survivors, taking vitamins B-12 and B-9- folic acid did not lower their risk for further heart disease. You know, my doctor had me taking these for years!

Here's another jolt, Dave. A recent study showed that low dose aspirin did not prevent first heart attacks among more than 2,500 type two diabetic males over 65 years old. They had the same risks as non-takers.

In fact, they were actually more likely to develop bleeding ulcers and retinal hemorrhage.

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