INTERESTING TIMES

The potentially dangerous ones are iron if you're middle aged and female are: multivitamins, vitamin B6, folic acid, beta carotene, magnesium, zinc, and copper. They used data from the Iowa Women's Health Study, which collected data on 38,772 women aged 55 to 69. From that sample, 15,594 died during the study period, which was about 40% of the initial group! Geeze. The people who took supplements were more educated, more physically active and more likely to get supplemental estrogen. Vitamin B6, folic acid, iron, magnesium, and zinc were associated with about a 3% to 6% increased risk for death, whereas copper was associated with an 18.0% increased risk for total mortality when compared with corresponding nonuse. On the other hand, women who took calcium were more likely to live longer (3.8% risk reduction).

My theory: people take more vitamins when their diet is crap. I know I do this. I'll eat a dinner of popcorn and ice cream and supplements sometimes. But when I eat fresh organic veggies and meat, I skip the supps and don't worry about it. Perhaps we "older" women are using our pills to justify a terrible diet. Maybe? Guess I better start taking my calcium, though.

Absolute risk increase (total mortality)
multis 2.4%
B6 4.1%
folic 5.9%
iron 3.9%
magnesium 3.5%
zinc 3.0%
copper 18.0%

SOURCES
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/751263?src=mpnews&spon=34
Arch Intern Med. 2011;171:1625-1633,1633-1634
http://archinte.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/short/171/18/1625
http://archinte.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/extract/171/18/1633

The Institute of Medicine is trying to catch up with modern medical practice and has bumped up the recommended daily allowances of Vitamin D and Calcium in response to overwhelming evidence that most North Americans are deficient.
( notes )

It's a sign of confidence when a health guru uses their own product. Null's Ultimate Power Meal apparently had 1,000x more vitamin D in it than it should have had. That is, two MILLION instead of two thousand IU's. It's pretty well known at this point that the AI (adequate intake of 400-600 IU) and UL (upper tolerable limit of 2000 IU) specified by the government are too low for most North Americans, but Null was definitely taking a toxic overdose. The NY Post Headline got a guffaw from me: "Putting the DIE in diet". Not that I have any ill will for Gary Null; I am happy he is getting better after 3 months of slow recovery, and sad that his kidneys may be permanently damaged. He's 65 years old, sort of late in life to take such hard hits.
( more )

See article on MD consult.
( notes on article including some interesting science on calcium supplementation contributing to calcification of atherosclerosis and increasing cardiovascular events )

What do you suspect if your patient chronically has canker sores in her mouth?
gluten enteropathy

What is the biggest difference between modern human diets and that of paleolithic humans?
we eat more grass family foods now
(wheat, corn, barley, oats, rice, ie: grains, agriculture)

What is the natural expiration age for humans?
somewhere between 110 and 120 years of age

What are the top five causes of death in the US?
CV dz, CA, medical care, DM, stroke
( scroll on down to see what you know )