Vitamin Supplements

Before you decide that you need to take iron supplements or change the way you eat, you should know where you stand and how much improvement you really need. To help you analyze your current diet, we’ve developed a system you can use to calculate your approximate iron intake. Our ODA for men is 10 mg; for women, it ranges from 12 to 15 mg, rising to 20 mg for women with heavy menstrual flow. For the purposes of this test, we have used an ODA of 15 mg.

To determine your average daily intake of iron, start by keeping an accurate food diary for three or four days. The longer you keep the diary, the more accurate your calculations will be. Write down exactly what you eat and drink, together with an estimate of the serving size. Read the rest of this entry »

If you answer yes to any of the following questions, you (or your child) have an above-average risk of developing an iron deficiency.

• Are you pregnant, or have you recently delivered a baby? During pregnancy, the fetus and placenta demand a great deal of iron from your body. Blood loss during childbirth can also lead to an iron deficiency. Read the rest of this entry »

Toxicity

Zinc does not generally cause toxic symptoms, except in very large amounts—such as 2 g or more taken at one time, or less (but still a lot) taken regularly over several weeks. By taking as little as two times the RDA of zinc over a period of months, for example, you can interfere with the status of copper in your body.

If you do have too much zinc in your body, you could experience vomiting and diarrhea, and have a decreased HDL (”good”) cholesterol level. More serious problems include anemia and an impaired immune function. Very high zinc intake-10 to 30 times the RDA for prolonged periods—can interfere with your immune system (as can levels that are too low). Read the rest of this entry »

Except for iron, no other trace mineral is as prevalent in the body as zinc. And few have been as highly promoted. You may have heard a lot of claims about zinc, in fact; many myths have flourished around this mineral. Zinc has been touted as a treatment for angina, acne, liver disease, and lack of energy— despite scarce evidence to support any of these claims. Some proponents have even insisted that zinc stimulates sexual potency.

Setting aside the spurious claims, zinc is an essential nutrient that plays important roles in the body. It is present in all of the body’s cells, with large amounts in the eyes, liver, bone, skin, hair, and nails. Read the rest of this entry »

How Much Selenium Do You Need?

Conclusive evidence of the need for selenium has emerged only in recent years, and our knowledge of this nutrient is still evolving. With some research indicating that elevated levels of selenium could help prevent certain types of cancer, we believe that the consumption of selenium at doses somewhat higher than the RDAs is important.

Optimal Daily Allowance

We recommend that all people consume 100 mcg of selenium per day. This nearly doubles the RDA for women and is almost a 50 percent increase for men.

While you could probably safely increase your selenium intake to 200 mcg per day, it’s unwise to go any higher because a few people may begin to experience adverse reactions at these elevated levels. Read the rest of this entry »

Selenium—in conjunction with an enzyme called glutathione peroxidase—acts as an antioxidant. In this role, it helps prevent oxidative damage in the body. In particular, selenium appears to work together with vitamin E to prevent injuries to cells. By consuming adequate amounts of both selenium and vitamin E, you can help your body fight off cell damage that can contribute to several serious diseases.

• Selenium appears to play a role in preventing heart disorders.
• Selenium seems to help prevent cancer.
• Selenium protects the body against the harmful effects of certain toxic substances, including arsenic, mercury, and copper. It appears to bind to these substances and render them less harmful. Read the rest of this entry »

In the ‘thirties the idea of such a list was very novel but it soon had a chance of being put to the test. With the coming of World War II and the rationing of food this type of information was very valuable. Vitamins were made available to mothers and babies, and the basic rations for everyone in this country included sufficient food for good health. Vitamins were added to margarine, bread and flour, and although food was limited and the diet was often monotonous we had all the food we needed and were healthier at the end of six years of war than we had ever been before.

Vitamins had proved their point. We believed in them, and the way was open for a new and thriving business. Health food shops sprang up in the ‘fifties and chemists started to sell an increasingly large range of vitamin preparations. Read the rest of this entry »

The history of vitamins as solo performers is very recent. They were not named until 1912 and did not enter the English dictionary until 1934 but their role in disease dates back some thousands of years. Early Egyptian records show that ox liver was used in the treatment of eye complaints; Hippocrates, ‘the Father of Medicine’, prescribed sensible diets in the treatment of illness; and in the Middle Ages when scurvy was the plague of sailors on long sea voyages, the cure was found in fresh fruit and vegetables, particularly citrus fruits. Today, we know that liver is a rich source of vitamin A and oranges and lemons supply vitamin C, and it is these factors which produce the cure, but in those days sickness and health belonged to religion and folklore as much as to the art of the healer. If a remedy worked and restored the sufferer to good health that was enough, and thanks were given to God and the doctor. Only a few scientists wondered why something had ‘worked’ and were prepared to search further for an answer. Read the rest of this entry »

There is a popular belief that B vitamins are ‘good for the nerves‘. In fact this is rather an upside-down statement and it would be better to say that lack of vitamin B is bad for the nerves. In health our nerves function very efficiently. They take information from outside our body to the brain and we know if something is hot or cold, red or green, sweet or sour. This information travels along ingoing (afferent) nerves to the brain which sifts the evidence and decides on a plan of action, i.e. to take the hand away from the hot water. It sends messages back along outgoing (efferent) nerves to the muscles concerned, and the hand is pulled away from the heat. We take much of this basic behaviour for granted but the reactions involved are many and complicated. Read the rest of this entry »

Thiamin is the first of the B complex vitamins and it is often referred to as vitamin B₁. Our daily intake of thiamin is calculated on the calories we need in our diet and this gives the first clue to its main function. It is involved in the production of energy in the body. If we go back to the section describing the general duties of vitamins you will remember that they act as coenzymes in the chemical reactions that take place in all normal metabolism, and some of those reactions produce energy from the food we eat. Fats, protein and carbohydrates are the three main categories of foods found in most diets. Fats are storage foods, acting as insulation and protection within the body. Read the rest of this entry »