Posted by IsoM on May 8, 2002, at 13:19:12
Here's the piece I mentioned I'd post if it was alright with Dr. Bob (it is). Be warned - not all with agree & it REALLY is long but I'm a detail freak.
I’m not sure if you want me to back up my info with sources. If you do, I’ll dig around the best I can, but much of this I’m offering is based on my reading medical, science, & nutrition journals over the years plus listening to any news on health that came out & researching it more when I could – I gleaned for friends, family, & my own benefit so never thought of saving sources to back it up.
Nutrients can be broken into a number of categories so that’s what I’ll do to try to make it more understandable. Hope I succeed & don’t instead complicate it. One category is not more important than another so my list is just as the ideas come into my mind.
Vitamins:
A &D
Both vitamin A & D are combined in halibut liver oil capsules. I know that RDAs call for 5,000 IU of A & 400 IU of D, but it’s based on the old info & the fear that people would buildup high levels in their liver from the enrichment of other foods like milk & butter. I think the failed attempt of the Antarctic by Roald Amundsen & his team who died horrible deaths from vitamin A toxicosis eating their dogs (& particularly their livers) did a lot to scare doctors about vitamin A.
D has been found to be far more useful than ever imagined before. Previously, it was just thought to help with bone & teeth formation but is used by the body for immunity, heart disease, joint diseases, etc. I’d recommend 10,000-20,000 IU of A & 800-1,600 IU of D daily. I take the upper amount – 4 capsules daily.
The Merck manual, plus others, mention 50,000-100,000 IU of A or more (AT LEAST) daily, long-term for adults before toxicity problems.The B Complex
You say you take a balanced B complex tablet daily. Most brands that say balanced mean all the numbers are the same [i.e. all 20 or 50 or 100 mg or mcg of the vitamins], but that way of packaging the B vitamins always upsets me. I think it’s unscrupulous of the manufacturers. It’s the most unbalanced way of combining them. [It’s like making a cake with either 2 cups or 2 teaspoons of everything – 2 cups flour, sugar, butter, milk, cocoa powder & 2 teaspoons baking powder, salt, etc. It would be a disaster.] Our bodies need more of some of them than others. Taking your B complex in pill form, the best bet is to choose a “stress formula”. That’s about the best form you’ll find. The stress formula will often include vitamin C & that’s fine. While I take a B complex tablet daily [half in the morning & half in the evening], I think it’s good to get your B vitamins from foods too, which is why I use nutritional yeast flakes [like brewer’s or torula’s but tastier]. The flakes are not just high in B vitamins but many minerals too like magnesium, iron, manganese, zinc, chromium [it’s gained interest with its connection with preventing diabetes] & selenium plus it’s about 50% protein. I also use a lot of wheat germ in baking. Some B vitamins are lost, but not badly, in baking but every bit helps. Whole grains of all sorts plus dried legumes also add more B vitamins. Lactobacillus from yogurt churns out B vitamins in our gut – though I’m not sure how much is absorbed from the lower intestine. I do take extra folic acid & B12 to be careful as you do. You’re taking choline which I think is good. I still haven’t added it to my supplements but have been considering it. It certainly wouldn’t harm. Don’t bother with lecithin capsules as a source of choline – they’re mostly oil & the amount of choline is quite low in them.
The B complex is a very important nutrient group, essential to proper metabolism, enzymatic pathways, & neurotransmitter production among others.C
Timed released vitamin C is good. I don’t think people need the esterfied type unless they are so sick that their body needs all the help it can get for absorption. I take mine morning & evening as the timed-release occurs over a period of about 8 hours. Still make sure you get fresh food forms of C like veggies & fruits daily. In foods, you don’t get straight C but bioflavanoids, rutins, & other related nutrients.E
Make sure you get the natural form not the synthetic. Most vitamins are the same molecularly, both natural or synthetic. The only difference is where they were synthesized – a lab, our body, or a plant. But with E, it IS different. It’s a mirror image version [like the difference between our right hand & our left] & the synthetic version is nearly as chemically active in our body & is thought to be somewhat toxic actually. Natural version will always say D [or small d] alpha tocopherol while synthetic says DL [or dl].
I’d suggest at least 400 IU & probably not more than 800 IU daily.EFAs
Essential fatty acids are best gotten from foods. I do think having a bowl of unsalted mixed nuts & snacking on them through the day is great. I’d recommend using flax seeds as much as you can. I buy hemp seed oil & use that too. Use sesame seeds like tahani butter [easy & cheap to make your own in a food processor]. I think rather than just relying on salmon oil, I’d use a mixture. Salmon oil, but also cod liver oil [the vitamins A & D aren’t very high in them as compared to halibut], flaxseed oil, primrose oil – all capsules & take perhaps one or two of each depending on how much you can tolerate without your GERD bothering you. Foods ARE really the best way to get the EFAs. [Check out this link: http://math.ucsd.edu/~ebender/Health%20&%20Nutrition/Nutrition/oil_good.html ]K
Still not a lot known about this except how it’s used in blood clotting. I think a balanced diet in raw vegetables & fruits plus intestinal bacteria activity provides all we need.Minerals:
Calcium
I prefer a chelated form of calcium as we don’t absorb some forms nearly as well. Calcium citrate or calcium gluconate are both chelated. There is a big difference in the forms the minerals come in. About 500-1,000 mg daily is needed depending on different factors.Magnesium
Ditto for magnesium – a chelated form is best, otherwise you just end up with the calcium & magnesium mostly just neutralising your stomach acid. Magnesium should be roughly one half of the amount of calcium for the best balance.Other Minerals
Don’t overdo the zinc – more is not better. I prefer to get my supplemental minerals from the nutritional yeast & a good assorted diet of veggies & fruits. Chromium is a plus in the yeast flakes. [And contrary to how many think, yeast flakes doesn’t make any yeast infection worse. Yeast flakes is the by-product of live food (not bread or beer type) yeast & is completely inert & dead & has been treated by heat. Not to mention, yeast infections & yeast organisms used to grow these flakes are in entirely different families! Like saying because carrots & apples are both dicot plants, a bad reaction to one gives problems with the other.]Glucosamine
Personally, I’ve not found glucosamine to be beneficial but some are convinced it is. It’s certainly not harmful so if some are benefited, I see no reason to discourage them except for possibly the costs, but it’s not that expensive. The reason I don’t believe it to be helpful is based on the same reason that diabetics can’t take insulin orally but need to inject it. The molecule is a large, complex one that its broken down by the digestive system into its component parts. http://www.rice.edu/~jenky/sports/glucosamine.html
Any glucosamine I get comes from my making soup from bones & the resulting broth. If it gels when cool, it contains glucosamine.
You might also want to check out a glucosamine online study being done at the Boston University School of Medicine: http://etrials.bumc.bu.edu/ It’s no longer taking on more people though.Much of what I’ve read about a study linking it to improved joint health comes from the same study which only involved 212 people, though there’s more studies that have been done but most are considered ambiguous. I think when the BUSM study comes out, it may have better info, but I still think an online, unsupervised study isn’t the best. I completely agree that glucosamine supplementation is far safer than NSAIDs even if it doesn’t improve cartilage re-growth. [Vitamin C was found to be effective in re-growth of cartilage years ago though]. Glucosamine doesn’t cause damage as NSAIDs can.
About any supplements, it’s best to take with food. If you don’t have enough food in your stomach, much of the B complex vitamins will be flushed out in your urine [the bright yellow colour from B2]. Oil soluble vitamins absolutely need food to be used as bile needs to be released into the stomach to aid with absorption. You’re better off dividing some of your doses into smaller ones throughout the day as you eat. Remember, in nature, our vitamins & minerals come contained in food, not capsules!
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And lastly, this site has a short list of some foods with interesting info about them. I don’t know if you’d find it useful but you can always look. But, at the top of the page are also links to anti-oxidants & trace minerals in foods. I’m giving this site ’cause I still think the best source for nutrients is food. We’re just beginning to understand how various nutrients & essential chemicals work together so I think it’s important to make sure that the foods we eat are the main source of our nutrition, not just supplements. When I used to manage a health store, many years ago, I was dumb-struck by the number of people who just wanted to eat their average unhealthy, high junk food diet & simply take pills or supplements to make everything better. People are still the same, if not worse, due to more nutrients known & being available in pill form. I don’t think you’re like that at all but hope you do find these links useful.
Food Index [not much is listed yet but it’s still in the works]
http://math.ucsd.edu/~ebender/Health%20&%20Nutrition/Foods/foods.html#anchor61870A person does need to get a good balance of enough protein & complex carbohydrates too but you probably know that already. Without sufficient protein, our body can’t make the hormones, neurotransmitters, different enzymes needed, let alone repair cellular damage. As for a special diet or supplements for bipolar disorder, I don’t think there’s enough evidence saying that anything we take can alter something like this, or even help that I know of. It may be an area I just haven’t heard of.
Hope this covers it all & doesn’t overwhelm you. I tend to give more, rather than less, info as it’s what I would want from others.
poster:IsoM
thread:105607
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20020503/msgs/105607.html