Effect of Four-Year Selenium and Coenzyme Q10 Supplementation on Cardiovascular Mortality

by | May 11, 2020 | 2018, Aging, Cardiovascular Health, CoQ10 (Coenzyme Q10), Selenium

Written by Joyce Smith, BS. This study validates a previous 10-year follow-up of reduced cardiovascular mortality risk in elderly participants who supplemented with coenzymeQ10 (CoQ10) and selenium for 4 years.

seleniumSelenium, a trace element present in all living cells 1, is a powerful antioxidant that plays a key role in heart health 2. While selenium in US soil reflects adequate levels (<120ug/L) 3, many European countries have selenium soil concentration levels below 90 ug/L, making dietary selenium supplementation a requisite. CoQ10, a powerful antioxidant and anti-inflammatory, works interdependently with selenium 4 to protect against lipid peroxidation 5. The body’s production of CoQ10 is reduced by 50% by age 80, thus in areas of inadequate selenium soil levels, selenium supplementation is important to heart health.

A previous 10-year study by Alehagen and colleagues reported a significant decrease in CV mortality with just four years of selenium and CoQ10 intervention 6. The present study 7 is a 2-year follow up of the same 10-year study and further validates the cardiac benefits derived in the previous study. In addition, the study evaluates the effects of a 12-year follow-up in subgroups of men and women with diabetes, ischemic heart disease (IHD) and hypertension due to impaired cardiac function.

The original study involved 443 healthy elderly subjects randomly assigned to a 4-year supplementation of either CoQ10 capsules (200 mg/day) and organic selenium yeast tablets (200 micrograms/day) or a placebo. The 12 years of follow-up provided data on 181 people (100 in the CoQ10 group; 81 in the placebo group). Findings revealed that cardiovascular mortality in the selenium plus CoQ10 group was 28%, compared to almost 39% in the placebo group (P<0.0001), providing a cardiovascular mortality risk reduction of almost 40% for the intervention group. The risk reduction seen in the selenium-CoQ10 group after 4 years of supplementation and again at the 12-year follow-up was also significant (P<0.0007).

Separating the intervention group by gender revealed that women seemed to benefit more than men, which may be linked to lower CoQ10 levels in the women at the start of the supplementation period 8. In fact, women had a significant risk reduction (P<0.0004) while only a trend was seen for men (P for trend <0.057). Moreover, when participants taking selenium and CoQ10 were subdivided into smaller subgroups and followed up for 12 years, a significant reduction was seen in CV mortality risk  for diabetes (P=0.03), hypertension (P=0.005), ischemic heart disease  (P=0.02)and severe cardiac impairment (P=0.002). This reduced risk was sustained when various group combinations were tested. Researchers believe that the anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidative properties may have at least partially contributed to Coenzyme Q10 and selenium’s cardiovascular protection. However, based on the small sample sizes, the Alehagen team consider the study data “hypothesis-generating, since the study results are both “intriguing and surprising”. Additional studies are warranted to validate this hypothesis.

Among the study limitations was the geographic location (Sweden) where selenium soil levels are low and does not allow for generalization of results. The study had a limited sample size which makes extrapolations to larger populations difficult. The evaluations of the smaller subgroups were even more challenging since they were compared to the main study group. Lastly, the majority of the CV mortalities were based on death certificates which are not as reliable as autopsies.

Source: Alehagen, Urban, Jan Aaseth, Jan Alexander, and Peter Johansson. “Still reduced cardiovascular mortality 12 years after supplementation with selenium and coenzyme Q10 for four years: A validation of previous 10-year follow-up results of a prospective randomized double-blind placebo-controlled trial in elderly.” PloS one 13, no. 4 (2018).

© 2018 Alehagen et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

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Posted May 11, 2020.

Joyce Smith, BS, is a degreed laboratory technologist. She received her bachelor of arts with a major in Chemistry and a minor in Biology from  the University of Saskatchewan and her internship through the University of Saskatchewan College of Medicine and the Royal University Hospital in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. She currently resides in Bloomingdale, IL.

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