Jul 2007
Who woulda thought? Folic acid is effective.
Thursday, July 26, 2007 Filed in:
Medical
After the incessant drumbeat coming out
of the pharma-pumped media disparaging nutrition, a refreshing
article came out the other day: "Folic Acid May Lower Stroke Risk."
One of the key findings is
that there are greater improvements in risk in the people who took
it longer. This is, of course, obvious, since you can't expect to
starve yourself for months then have a good meal and be right back
to normal.
Of course, in order not to lose her professorship, dr. Carlsson (who is quoted in the article) has to say that it is premature to recommend a benign and inexpensive nutrient to prevent strokes in the population that shows the greatest reduction in stroke risk from folic acid supplementation (people who've never had strokes, "primary prevention").
Dr. Wang (one of the researchers) suggests that "people in the U.S. who eat healthy diets probably get enough folic acid in the foods they eat." Any guesses what fraction of the population would fall in to that category?
Of course, in order not to lose her professorship, dr. Carlsson (who is quoted in the article) has to say that it is premature to recommend a benign and inexpensive nutrient to prevent strokes in the population that shows the greatest reduction in stroke risk from folic acid supplementation (people who've never had strokes, "primary prevention").
Dr. Wang (one of the researchers) suggests that "people in the U.S. who eat healthy diets probably get enough folic acid in the foods they eat." Any guesses what fraction of the population would fall in to that category?
Most Americans obese by 2015?
Saturday, July 21, 2007 Filed in:
Medical
Epidemiologic Reviews just came out with news that not only are an alarming number of
Americans overweight and obese now, over half the American
population will be by 2015. They're actually predicting 75% of
adults and 24% of children will be overweight or obese.
What can you do to avoid becoming one of them or to leave their ranks? Diet and exercise are simple to say, but not so simple to do. It helps to have support and that why I've started offering First Line Therapy in my office. First Line Therapy is a research based lifestyle program to improve all your risk factors for chronic diseases (including obesity, heart disease, diabetes and more).
Call the office and find out how you can join our First Line Therapy program. We are enrolling more people starting in August.
What can you do to avoid becoming one of them or to leave their ranks? Diet and exercise are simple to say, but not so simple to do. It helps to have support and that why I've started offering First Line Therapy in my office. First Line Therapy is a research based lifestyle program to improve all your risk factors for chronic diseases (including obesity, heart disease, diabetes and more).
Call the office and find out how you can join our First Line Therapy program. We are enrolling more people starting in August.
Catching up with vitamin D
Thursday, July 19, 2007 Filed in:
Medical
A recent (June 29, 2007)
article points out that even in Hawaii, 11.1
hours/week of total body skin exposure (on average) is inadequate
to get 51% of the participants to have an adequate amount of
vitamin D (which they define as a level of 30 ng/ml, lower than I
like). As the lead author states, "This implies that the common
clinical recommendation to allow sun exposure to the hands and face
for 15 minutes may not ensure vitamin D sufficiency."
This echoes nicely what I've been telling patients for some time based on my own experience of having pale skin, walking to work and taking supplements with 400 iu of vitamin D3 daily and still having a level of only 23: "15 minutes of sun exposure to hands and face daily adequate? A lie. 400 iu daily adequate? A lie."
The article ends with a conservative recommendation of "treating vitamin D deficiency with vitamin D supplementation, "it seems prudent" to aim for a serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D concentration no greater than the maximum produced by natural UV exposure; i.e., approximately 60 ng/mL."
They don't mention that it commonly takes 2,000-4,000 iu daily of D3 to get anywhere near that level, a dose that will give doctors with no nutritional background fecal incontinence. This dose will not get anyone near the lowest toxicity level seen of 150.
So, this article adds to the stack of journal articles supporting higher levels of vitamin D, but will it catch on among conventional docs? Not unless there are vitamin D reps coming in with donuts and pens that say "Vitamin D3" on them. If we're lucky, however, I'm wrong and every doc will start checking vitamin D levels, then recommending adequate vitamin D supplementation (for pennies a day) and cut the rates of cancer and degenerative diseases by huge amounts (some estimates say 50% reduction in cancer with adequate vitamin D).
If you want to learn more about the benefits of vitamin D, the Vitamin D council (.com or .org) is a good resource.
This echoes nicely what I've been telling patients for some time based on my own experience of having pale skin, walking to work and taking supplements with 400 iu of vitamin D3 daily and still having a level of only 23: "15 minutes of sun exposure to hands and face daily adequate? A lie. 400 iu daily adequate? A lie."
The article ends with a conservative recommendation of "treating vitamin D deficiency with vitamin D supplementation, "it seems prudent" to aim for a serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D concentration no greater than the maximum produced by natural UV exposure; i.e., approximately 60 ng/mL."
They don't mention that it commonly takes 2,000-4,000 iu daily of D3 to get anywhere near that level, a dose that will give doctors with no nutritional background fecal incontinence. This dose will not get anyone near the lowest toxicity level seen of 150.
So, this article adds to the stack of journal articles supporting higher levels of vitamin D, but will it catch on among conventional docs? Not unless there are vitamin D reps coming in with donuts and pens that say "Vitamin D3" on them. If we're lucky, however, I'm wrong and every doc will start checking vitamin D levels, then recommending adequate vitamin D supplementation (for pennies a day) and cut the rates of cancer and degenerative diseases by huge amounts (some estimates say 50% reduction in cancer with adequate vitamin D).
If you want to learn more about the benefits of vitamin D, the Vitamin D council (.com or .org) is a good resource.
