At a time when people declare their current cult subscription—Trader Joe’s tote, Rhode Peptide Treatment, Labubus, all of them—by wearing it on their body, it was only a matter of time before the wellness freaks joined the club. Enter vitamin patches, the lovechild of cutesy pimple patches and your daily supplements. These stick-ons are purported to deliver vitamins through the skin and directly into the bloodstream, making it a tempting alternative for anyone who wants to announce that, yes, they take care of their health, and no, they don’t enjoy swallowing pills.
There’s little surprise that these vitamin-spiked adhesive films are quickly gaining ground within wellness circles—what’s a better selling point than the promise of a quick fix? For anyone who has ever had a pimple disappear after a few hours of being smothered under an adhesive patch, the allure of vitamin patches doesn’t call for a massive leap of imagination. But how much of the hype around these patches actually holds up?
“Adhesive patches can deliver vitamins and other nutrients directly into the bloodstream through the skin, [through] a process known as transdermal delivery,” explains Dr Samrat Shah, consultant physician at Ruby Hall Clinic in Pune. When applied to a hairless area of skin, these patches claim to release their contents over a period ranging from 12 to 24 hours. “The idea is to bypass the digestive system, which can be beneficial for individuals with malabsorption issues or sensitive stomachs,” he adds.
Can a tiny patch really help you tick off your vitamin requirements for the day? This hesitation is not unfamiliar to Kelly Gilbert, a former British Vogue editor and founder of The What Supp Co. “There is some scepticism about vitamin patches, because some people expect to feel completely different immediately after applying one.” She argues this isn’t a reasonable expectation. “No one takes a multivitamin pill and demands to feel immediately different. Doing small, good things for our bodies, like applying a patch, is subtle and cumulative,” she reasons. In a bid to satisfy the itch for instant gratification, her brand has worked aromatherapy into its patches so customers can observe a functional benefit as soon as they apply the patch. “Inhaling the scent of peppermint in a detox patch has positive cleansing effects that link to the processes of the vitamins and adaptogens within the patch,” she says.
Closer to home, vitamin patches have been brought to Indian shores by Patch Up Health founded by Radhika Rajpal, who has previously worked at Barclays. When she was vacationing in India, she was startled to discover that the supplements that she regularly consumed during her daily runs were laced with additives that were banned in Europe. Stymied by the lack of additive-free supplements and driven by the fact that 40 per cent of adults struggle with swallowing pills of any kind, she devised Patch Up Health as a non-invasive method of consuming vitamins without additives, delivered in the form of a skin-friendly adhesive patch.
If the promise of a patch that can help you meet all your vitamin needs sounds too good to be true, it is perhaps because it is. Gilbert will be the first one to let you know that vitamin patches cannot address larger nutrient deficiencies within the body. “Since they are convenient and easy to use, patches encourage regular use and building good habits that are the key to good health. But patches, by their nature, cannot treat deficiencies, as the surface area is not large enough to contain a dose high enough to meet that need,” she concedes.
The first order of business when setting realistic expectations from your patches is understanding which vitamins can and cannot be absorbed by the skin. “Ingredients with a molecular weight of less than 500 daltons can be accepted through the skin barrier. But vitamins like B12 are 1,300 daltons and cannot be absorbed transdermally. It is important to be aware of this when choosing a patch,” Gilbert adds.
It is perhaps these caveats surrounding vitamin patches that can lead to mixed reactions from its users. When Sanam Saleh, a UK-based chartered accountant, first encountered vitamin patches, she was eager to dive in. Over the course of eight to 10 weeks, she tried slapping on different patches in rotation for improving sleep, boosting energy and focus, as well as combatting period pain. The results left her confused. “I slept well some days, but also badly on other days. Some days I was energised and focused, and on other days not so much,” she says. However, the period patches proved to be an all-round disappointment, and she found herself reaching for ibuprofen to combat the pain. At the end of the experiment, she walked away viewing the patches as a placating placebo.
Her findings are not surprising to Dr Shah, who believes that vitamin patches lack rigorous clinical trials and robust scientific backing. “Research is still in its early stages, and the results are not consistently promising. This suggests that these patches are often not as effective as traditional oral supplements,” he says. For those who have difficulty swallowing pills, there are newer formats of oral supplements to be explored, such as vitamin gummies and fast-dissolve tablets. “These are oral forms that offer a more pleasant experience than swallowing pills and can serve as a good alternative,” the Pune-based physician believes.
While vitamin patches may help you visibly flex your interest in wellness (unlike oral supplements), they do not serve as a reliable stand-in for a balanced diet. “This [food] is the most effective and recommended way to get your vitamins. Eating a wide variety of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean meats and dairy products provides a full spectrum of nutrients in their most bioavailable forms, along with fibre and other beneficial compounds,” he adds.
