Transcription:

RadioMD Presents:Healthy Talk | Original Air Date: April 30, 2015
Host: Michael Smith, MD

Healthy talk with Michael Smith MD and now here is the country doctor with a city education. Dr. Mike.

DR. MIKE: So, did you know that there are little known benefits of higher, more ideal dosing in vitamins and minerals? You know, most...As a matter of fact, a sister of mine--I'm not going tell you the name of the product, but we'll call it a very generic multi vitamin. She's been taking it for quite some time and it's dosed off a very low dose system, a very archaic system known as the recommended daily intake or the recommended daily allowance.

I always tell her if, you know, her goal is to prevent scurvy, awesome product. But there are so my other health benefits attributed to vitamins and minerals a lot of people just don't know about it. But it takes higher dosing what I called in my book, The Supplement Pyramid, ideal daily intake. The IDI--ideal dosing and it's based right off the research right from PubMed.com. So, I wanted to run through some of the basic vitamins and minerals and just make known to you, my listeners, of some of the benefits that you could obtain by taking the more ideal dose of these important, what are called micronutrients.

Let's start with Vitamin A. The ideal daily intake of Vitamin A is 5000 milligrams, not the 500 or so that you'll find in those generic products like my sister takes. At this higher ideal intake of Vitamin A, you can actually improve lung function in asthma patients and you can also support all the mucosal lining throughout your body.

So, we are talking lung and gut. It's a little known fact that if you have ulcer disease or inflammatory bowel disease or any sort of inflammatory process in your lungs, sinuses; higher dose-- more ideal dose of Vitamin A--can help. It's one of those little known benefits of higher dose Vitamin A.

What about Vitamin B12--very popular vitamin? The recommended daily intake is about, I don't know, maybe 10 micrograms or something; it's pretty low, may be 100 micrograms in some products but, really, the ideal daily intake of B12 is more about a milligram a day. In some cases, a little bit higher but at least a milligram a day. At that higher dose, Vitamin B12 has been shown to improve nerve function and this is one a lot of people don't know. It protects or prevents from arterial plaque formation. Higher dose B12 is good for the coronary arteries.

Vitamin C – the recommended daily intake is about, oh, it depends on who you read: 50-100 milligrams. That's so low. The ideal intake for Vitamin C, it's more of a range for this important vitamin probably 500 milligrams to upwards of 2000 milligrams. When you do these higher doses of Vitamin C, this is when you start getting into the immune properties of Vitamin C, the cardiovascular properties of Vitamin C, and there's even some evidence that higher dose of Vitamin C can protect against ulcer disease in your gut; something you probably have never heard of.

Vitamin D is a big one! D as in dog. You know, I think the government is still recommending something like, what is it? 400 international units of Vitamin D. Listen, again, with Vitamin D, it's probably more important to look at blood level. I think the government recommends your blood level to be around 30-40 or something like that in your blood, all of that is just way too low. Vitamin D, the ideal dosing is probably more around, oh, at least 1000 units a day if not 2000 even upwards of 5000 units a day. Your blood level probably should be 50 and 70, not 30-ish. At the higher levels of Vitamin D, the higher intake, it's been shown to lower the risk of colon cancer, breast cancer, prostate cancer, blood-born cancers like leukemia, lymphomas.

I mean, it just goes...Did you know that there is a Vitamin D receptor on every single cell in the human body? I think the only exception that might actually be the red blood cell but the rest of them from thyroid to all of the other endocrine tissue, heart tissue, lung tissue, gut, I mean everything, has a Vitamin D receptor. 400 units and you will prevent rickets. Hey, if that's your goal, go for it but I think you can get so much more with an ideal intake of Vitamin D.

Vitamin E. Natural Vitamin E is very important. The ideal daily intake is about 400 units and at that level it's been shown to induce breast cancer cell death. It's called apoptosis. Also induces prostate cancer cell apoptosis, did you know that? At the higher dose Vitamin E, is great, also, just like Vitamin A for mucosal membrane--so gut and lung.

Vitamin K2. Remember that Vitamin K is broken up in to K1 and K2. K1 is for helping your blood to clot. We can get that from our diet pretty easily. It's Vitamin K2 that we are more interested in because we are probably more deficient in that. Vitamin K2 is all about managing calcium in your body. As a matter of fact, if you don't have enough Vitamin K on board and you do a calcium supplement or you eat a calcium rich food source, that calcium may not get to your bones and can be stuck in other tissues forming stones, forming arterial plaques and that kind of stuff.

So, we need to make sure that we get enough Vitamin K2. The ideal daily intake of Vitamin K2 is around, say, 1000 micrograms. You know, that's probably a good dose for Vitamin K2. At that level you are going to reduce bone fracture risk, you are going to reduce the risk of coronary disease. So, Vitamin K2 about 1000 micrograms.

Calcium. Listen, you got to take calcium and don't listen to the doctors who are scared of calcium now because of a really poor study that showed that women taking calcium supplements had an increased risk of heart attack. That's because they were not taking Vitamin D or Vitamin K2. I just explained why you really don't want to take calcium by itself. It's important to take it with Vitamin D and Vitamin K2. If you are taking Vitamin D and you are taking Vitamin K2, women probably want to be around 1200 milligrams a day of calcium, men around 600 milligrams a day. It does just about everything in the body, but at that higher dose did you know that calcium can inhabit the production of body fats? Yes. It's not just about bones.

Chromium. The FDA allows me to tell you that chromium can be used for the treatment of diabetes. It's really good at managing sugar levels and really reducing sugar levels. But, of course. the amount of chromium that most of the generic multivitamins use, which is only about a 100 micrograms or so, isn't going to do it. It's not going to affect your sugar level at all. You need about 450 micrograms a day and that's going to improve insulin sensitivity, sugar management and has been shown to help with memory and recall. Yes. Chromium. But it takes that ideal intake.

Copper. You need about a milligram a day. A lot of multivitamins--generic multivitamins on the market don't even put copper in but you need about a milligram a day. That has been shown to protect the heart and the bones.

Magnesium. How can we not talk about the all-important magnesium involved with about 350 physiological reactions in the body? If you look at all the age related disorders people are dealing with like blood pressure issues, heart disease, bone issues, brain issues. Listen, it correlates well with the magnesium deficiencies. 400-500 milligrams a day is probably the ideal intake. Not only you will improve bone with magnesium, brain with magnesium, heart with magnesium, it's just good for every single cell in your body. It's just about as important as Vitamin D is but it takes that higher intake—that 400-500 milligram level.

So, the point I am making? Recommended daily intake. Yes. It's important for preventing deficiencies but you really want is the ideal intake.

This is Healthy talk on Radio MD. I'm Dr. Mike. Stay well!