Pill Overload!

Dr. Alan Christianson, NMD

IntegrativeHealthCare.com – Scottsdale, AZ

In our kitchen we have a cabinet over the oven, two doors with two shelves each.  The darned thing is full to overflowing with supplement bottles!  Every few months I throw out the things I’ll never need or the ones that are outdated and within a few weeks it’s full again somehow.

The funny thing is that most of you probably have a cupboard or two just like this!  My rationalization is that I’m in the industry. I am given samples and I always test new products personally.  I know, poor excuses.

How many pills should a healthy adult take anyway? If you get all the mailings and special offers, it seems that every week a new, miraculous pill is discovered that will cure your piles, consumption and vapors.  What’s more, you can get 2 bottles for the price of 1 if you act now.

Since so many things sound exciting and promising, there is no end the pills we would take if we based our decision on marketing hype.

The core purpose of supplementation is to make up for a lack of nutrients in the diet. Ever heard the conventional party line on supplements?  It goes like this: “we get all the vitamins and minerals we need from a balanced diet.”  Here’s another good one: “vitamins give you nothing more than expensive urine.”

Early in my practice I taught nutrition at a medical school for a few years.  My favorite exercise was to take the young doctors to be and have them use nutritional textbooks and construct a week’s diet that met the RDA.  What does RDA stand for?  The D is not daily, it is actually “dietary” since it is meant to reflect a week’s average.  If you fall short on folic acid on Monday and Tuesday, there is always Wednesday to catch up!

The amazing outcome of this experiment is that even when you’re looking at charts of foods with their nutrients and making a diet that would never occur spontaneously, you can not meet the RDA guidelines!

That is not factoring in soil depletion, the fact that the RDA’s are woefully dated or the fact that peoples nutritional needs can vary 20 fold.

We do need supplements. Some studies have shown that just taking a multi can lower mortality odds by 30% per year!

Basically adults need a multi, calcium/magnesium and fish oil.  Green foods supplements are options that can make up for a lack of good fruits and veggies.  Avoid ones with laxatives like senna, cascara sagrada, aloe or rhubarb.

Some basic concepts: I love the idea of liquids but when products are made this way they end up needing tons of flavors and preservatives.  Calcium/magnesium are exceptions, chemically they can exist in liquids with less flavorings and without preservatives.

Tablets are OK for calcium/magnesium blends but should be avoided for multivitamins.  Tableted multivitamins don’t break down well enough for absorption of trace minerals.

Iron does not belong in multivitamins.  If you are low in it, we need to know why and correct the problem.  If you’re not low in it, you don’t want extra.  Additionally it uses up the antioxidants and makes other minerals absorb poorly.

I’m not a fan of non-essential ingredients.  Along with the basics, many companies will add in a long list of herbs and non-essential nutrients in ridiculously small amounts.  I call this cosmetic labeling.  It reminds me of when a low budget movie headlines Al Pacino but he gets killed off in the first few minutes.

Look first at Biotin.  It is essential, but it is also the most expensive raw-material that goes into a multi.  Ever wonder why your vitamins have 5000% of the RDA for Thiamin and only 30% of the RDA for biotin?  Now you know, they’re being cheapskates!

Fatty acid supplementation is also critical, we talked about fats in a past article, if you missed it check here: (link to fat article)

Fish oil is the thing to take for fats.  Better products are tested for toxic metals, solvents and have a high concentration of EPA, like 400+ mg per capsule.

To make this happen you can purchase a good iron free multi in capsules.  Most high quality products that yield doses like this will require 4-8 pills per day.  Next is a cal mag supplement in capsules, tablets or liquid.  These are 2-4 capsules or 1 – 2 tbsp or liquid per day.  Fish oil can range from 2-8 gel caps or 1/2 – 3 tsp based on the concentration.  Just look for mg of EPA per serving.  Here is a tip, the cheap costco brand costs less per capsule but not per mg of EPA!

Men’s Nutrition Q+A

Dr. Mark Tosca, D.O.

KachinaFamilyPractice.com

What’s the verdict on carbs? Will they make me gain weight?

It depends. If you eat too many calories of any type – carb, fat, or protein – you’ll pack on the pounds. A controlled trial in the New England Journal of Medicine compared four groups following low-calorie diets that ranged from 35 -65 percent of calories from carbohydrates. The study found “no effect on weight loss of carbohydrate level through the target range of 35–65%.” While it’s best to choose food sources with the lowest carbohydrate load (CL), the bottom line is that total calories are what matters most.

What are trans fats and why are they so bad?

Some commercial makers of cakes, cookies, and deep-fried foods use “partially hydrogenated” oils. This means they’ve taken an unsaturated fat and turned it into a partially saturated fat (and trans-fats are a byproduct of this process). We’ve already been told that saturated fat isn’t good for us because it increases our “bad” or low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol. Trans-fats are worse. They not only raise our LDL cholesterol (like saturated fats) but they lower our good or HDL cholesterol. Fortunately, the FDA now mandates that the trans-fat content of food be included on food labels.

I’d like to gain a little muscle and tone up. Will protein supplements help?

Under most circumstances, no. The American Dietetic Association recommends that strength-training athletes consume 5 to 8 grams of protein per 10 pounds of body weight. For a 175-pound guy, that’s 90 to 140 grams of protein. Since a 3.5 ounce chicken breast has 30 grams of protein, this isn’t too difficult to accomplish. There may be circumstances where it’s advisable to take a supplement – for example, a weightlifter who is trying to reduce total calorie consumption to trim body fat for an upcoming competition. that athlete may not eat enough food to meet dietary protein needs as he trains.

Should I take an Omega-3 supplement like fish oil?

Research shows that modest fish oil consumption is beneficial. The Omega 3 fatty acids eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) appear to be the ingredients in fish oil that reduce risk of atherosclerosis, heart attack, and stroke. Consume about 250 mg of EPA plus DHA daily, by eating three ounces of farmed Atlantic or wild Atlantic salmon each week for example. If you are unable to consume enough fish oil through the seafood you eat, a 1 gm (containing 200-800mg EPA+DHA) daily fish-oil supplement isn’t a bad idea.

How much caffeine is too much?

With 90 percent of men consuming it in some form each day, caffeine is, by far, our most popular drug. Moderate intake of 300 mg/day or less is safe. With our increasingly fast-paced lifestyles, it’s no surprise that caffeine has become available in several varieties of “energy” drinks and supplements. Guess which of the following has the highest caffeine content: Monster (16 oz.), Red Bull (8.3 oz.), or Starbucks brewed coffee (16 oz.). You could exceed the recommended intake of caffeine with one Starbucks coffee, which contains 320 mg of caffeine. Monster contains 160 mg and a Red Bull has 80 mg of caffeine.