6 Nutrients You Shouldn’t Ignore
Conventional dietary wisdom suggests that by following a ‘healthy diet’ you’ll get all the nutrients you need to lead a healthy life while greatly reducing your risk for chronic disease. In essence, that’s true. But in a perfect world you’d not only get the 45 or so nutrients you need every day, but more importantly in amounts known to reduce the risk for chronic conditions.
Nowadays, though, those who receive 100% of their recommended nutrient intake are the exception– not the rule. About one-third of our calories come from ‘junk food.’ Additionally, between refined, over-processed foods, nutrient-poor soils and an increased demand for fast foods, we are sadly missing the mark for optimal health. These lifestyle changes have zapped the nutrient content out of many diets.
Think you’re meeting your nutrient needs?
It’s important to remember how the dietary guidelines are calculated. They are set as a minimum one has to consume in order to avoid a dangerous deficiency–not the amount one must consume in order to maintain vibrant health and avoid chronic disease.
While it’s true that if you follow dietary guidelines most of the time you can avoid glaring clinical nutrient deficiencies, if you’re like me you want to do more than just get a “passing grade.”
So how can you be sure you’re hitting the mark for health? Clinical studies have indicated that six nutrients have proven to be critical for optimal health and wellness when obtained in amounts higher than just what is recommended to avoid deficiency.
So how can you be sure you’re hitting the mark for health? Clinical studies have indicated that six nutrients have proven to be critical for optimal health and wellness when obtained in amounts higher than just what is recommended to avoid deficiency.
By not only meeting, but exceeding the nutrient guidelines for these six specific vitamins and minerals, you can reduce your risk for many chronic diseases such as macular degeneration, obesity and even cancer.
Boost these six Nutrients
Boost these six Nutrients
I harbor a less-than-secret love for this superhero nutrient. Technically not a vitamin, but rather a pro-hormone, vitamin D has at least 2700 binding sites on our DNA, near genes that are linked with almost every known chronic disease. The list seemingly goes on and on. Higher blood levels are proving to reduce many ailments of the civilized world: 20+ cancers, periodontal disease, MS, diabetes, heart disease, stroke, dementia, macular degeneration, depression, rheumatoid arthritis, autism, colds, influenza and more.
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The problem is that most of us are not getting what nature has provided; vitamin D production via the action of UVB light from the sun. Also, there are virtually no significant natural food sources that can supply enough vitamin D to meet your body’s needs. While fatty fish like salmon, mackerel, trout, sardines or herring can supply a small amount, you’d have to consume a 6-7 oz serving of fish every day and even stil, you’d only get about 600-800IU from that valiant attempt.
The answer? Take Supplements. Most adults need 3000-5000 IU, daily. This is not only safe but is an amount that the body would use every day if it was available. Be sure to take your vitamin D with a fat-containing meal.
Like all vitamins and minerals, magnesium wears many hats. Think about it, our complex bodies of some 100 trillion cells runs on some 15 vitamins and 15 minerals. Not at all the least important, magnesium is involved in about 350 metabolic pathways. Back in the early 1900s, most of us were getting about 500 mg of magnesium every day, an amount that science is now finding to be necessary for optimal health but sadly, most of us are only getting about 200 mg per day; enter cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, osteoporosis, and vascular calcification (without enough magnesium, and vitamin D for that matter, calcium gets dumped into our blood vessels).
The answer? Include dark green leafy greens, nuts, seeds, 100% whole grains, 85% dark chocolate, fish, legumes and a good magnesium supplement.
Your thyroid needs iodine to produce hormones that drive your metabolism. A long-forgotten nutrient after table salt was iodized as a public health measure to prevent goiter, an optimal intake of iodine is critical for proper thyroid function. But like many nutrient deficiencies of the past, suboptimal intakes of iodine and signs of goiter are starting to pop up again with the anti-sodiumfervor has prompted many to give up table salt.
You might be thinking ‘what about all the sodium in processed foods?’ Turns out sodium used in processed and pre-prepared foods is not iodized. Now, many individuals are getting less than half of the recommended daily iodine intake of 150 mcg.
The answer? Continue to reduce your sodium from processed foods, but don’t shy away from using a pinch of table salt in cooking and at the. Most basic multivitamins have iodine and animal feed tends to be fortified so milk and yogurt will have it as well. For the adventurous culinary types, try some seaweed and kelp! You can also take a kelp supplement to meet iodine needs.
Once upon a time, we used to get loads of potassium. In fact, our kidneys are well suited to get rid of extra potassium and hold onto sodium since we used to get a lot more potassium in our diet than sodium as sodium was rare before the onslaught of processed foods. The result of this evolutionary reduction in potassium intake is an increase in blood pressure and calcium loss from our bones. Potassium’s importance is now so well recognized that there’s now a daily recommended intake of 4700 mg per day.
More important than just potassium and sodium intake, though, is the potassium to sodium ratio; we need to get about five times more potassium than sodium.
The answer? Not surprisingly, more fruits, vegetables and whole grains. Here’s a few foods that can help boost potassium levels:
- Medium avocado: 800-1000 mg
- Medium banana: 400 mg
- 1 cup of skim milk yogurt: 425 mg
- 1 cup of low-sodium garden cocktail: 700 mg
- 1/2 cup of kidney beans: 350 mg
- 1 mango: 325 mg
- 3oz halibut: 500 mg
Vitamin B12 is crucial to reduce the risk for many problems such as neuropathy (the loss of feeling in the hands and limbs), pernicious anemia, and dementia and brain shrinkage. It is also needed for red blood cell production and keeping homocysteine low (high homocysteine increases the risk for heart disease).
Since our bodies absorb vitamin B12 less efficiently as we age, vitamin B12 deficiency is more common than you think. Risk factors include being vegetarian, being over the age of 50 (due to a decreased ability to absorb it) or having diseases of the small intestines such as celiac or Crohn’s, ulcers, parasites. Excessive alcohol intake or the common use of antacids drugs like proton-pump inhibitors (Prevacid) or H2 antagonists like Zantac may also play a role in vitamin B12 deficiency.
While the recommended intake of vitamin B12 is a mere 2.4mcg (i.e. hardly any), not getting enough has dire consequences.
The answer? Eat more vitamin B12-rich foods like beef, pork, lamb, chicken, or oysters and clams. You can also source fortified foods such as cereals or take a high-quality multivitamin (especially if you fit the bill for any of the risk factors above). A vitamin B12 supplement is especially important for vegetarians and those over the age of 50. Since dietary and supplemental vitamin B12 may be poorly absorbed it’s best to find the B12 form known as methylcoboalamin in the form of a lozenge.
Some may need B12 shots from their doctor but don’t worry, it’s essentially impossible to get too much vitamin B12–toxicity is virtually non-existent.
Like vitamin D, vitamin A, or retinol, retinal, retinoids, is a pre-hormone; retinoic acid is the active form. Also like vitamin D, vitamin A directly interacts with our genes to modify the production of proteins that are involved in many life sustaining processes.
Vitamin A is needed by the retina and is critical for low light and color vision. In its active form, vitamin A is essential for growth, helping the bones to form and strengthen, and is essential for healthy epithethial cells.
These are the cells that line the inside of your digestive tract including your mouth and throat, your lungs, and sinus cavity making vitamin A a first line of defense against viruses, bacteria and other pathogens. The epithethial cells provide a physical barrier against the outside world . Without enough vitamin A, the immune system cannot do its job of fighting off any foreign invaders that sneak past the body’s first line of protection.
Vitamin A is found exclusively in animal foods. It is not found in plant foods. Because beta carotene and some other carotenoids can be converted to vitamin A, foods containing those carotenoids are typically listed as being a source of vitamin A. I think this is a mistake as it gives the impression that eating carotene-rich foods is sufficient. There is ample evidence indicating the amount of beta carotene that is converted to vitamin A isn’t as much as we once thought, and the conversion can be impeded by many things.
According to the 2007-2008 Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES III), the average intake of vitamin A for both men and women is below the recommended amount. This is in part due to the vilification of vitamin A-rich foods because of their fat and cholesterol intake. Now, many people are unnecessarily avoiding them.
The answer? It’s important to get a variety of nutrients from a variety of foods and vitamin A is no exception. In addition to dark green and orange fruits and vegetables, which will supply lots of different carotenoids, be sure to include some animal sources of pre-formed vitamin A several times per week. This includes eggs, liver, liver pate, a good quality cod liver oil that contains both vitamin A and D, aged cheeses, tuna, fatty fish like salmon, sardines, mackerel, herring and trout.
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