The National Institute of Health Consensus Development Conference on Optimal Calcium Intakes recommended that all people over 65 take 1500 milligrams of calcium a day to reduce the risk of fractures due to bone-thinning and osteoporosis. Younger people should consume 1000-1200mg calcium per day. People who don't get this amount of calcium from their diet should consider taking calcium supplements. Women who consume sufficient amounts of calcium or take supplements most of their lives usually don't develop osteoporosis.
Of the 10 million Americans estimated to have osteoporosis, eight million are women and two million are men.**
Women who start taking calcium supplements just before they reach menopause or shortly after also benefit because the supplemental calcium replaces the excreted calcium.
Although women are far more susceptible to developing osteoporosis, older men may also eventually have bone problems.
If you do not consume enough calcium, you should definitely consider adding a calcium supplement to your daily diet to prevent osteoporosis.
Many studies indicate that calcium citrate is the form your body can most easily recognize and use. It is also easy on the stomach.
A New Epidemic
Nearly 20 years ago, health researchers at Harvard University sounded an alarm stating that there was a preventable epidemic threatening our country - calcium deficiency. The alarm helped to make people realize that many were not getting enough calcium from their diets. As a result, the sale of calcium supplements increased and several food products containing supplemental calcium appeared on food shelves. Unfortunately, the dire warnings issued by the Harvard group were not sufficient to help prevent the occurrence of a new epidemic, also related to calcium. The epidemic threatening us today is a deficiency of vitamin D.
Vitamin D is needed in the body to bring about the efficient absorption of calcium. Although this fascinating chemical is called a vitamin (read about its interesting history in "There's Something Funny About Nutrition") it is actually a hormone that jump-starts the production of a protein called calcium-binding protein (scientists aren't the most clever when it comes to naming things). This protein attaches to calcium in the intestine and carries it to the blood so it can be whisked off to the millions of cells that absolutely depend upon calcium to function. When there isn't enough vitamin D in the body, calcium is not absorbed or whisked adequately so the blood starts stealing it from the bones. Obviously, this leads to weak bones and therein lies the problem that concerns physicians throughout our country.
Vitamin D gets into our bodies either from eating foods in which it's stored-vitamin D is a fat soluble vitamin which should give you some idea where this is going-or by the conversion of cholesterol in the skin. The conversion of cholesterol to vitamin D requires ultraviolet rays from the sun. Thus, people need to either eat fatty foods that contain vitamin D, such as milk and other dairy products, or spend more time outdoors. Whoa! "Dairy products contain saturated fats that make us, well, fat so we diss them and we have all these neat, gory computer games so who wants to be outdoors?" This from way too many teenagers of this generation who are showing up in clinics with mysterious fractures that turn out to be a result of bone weakness resulting from vitamin D deficiency.
Physicians from every locale, but particularly in the northern states are seeing more cases of fractures from weakened bones. The weak bones result from poor absorption of calcium. Whether or not young people consume calcium fortified foods or drinks is not relevant if they aren't getting enough vitamin D to activate the production of the transporter that gets calcium out of the intestine and into the blood. Unfortunately, many youths who do go out in the sun are often at risk of vitamin D deficiency because they have heeded their doctor's or parents' warnings about skin cancer and slather on sunscreen, which blocks the ultraviolet rays of the sun. Youths from dark-skinned ethnic groups are also prone to D deficiency because their skin doesn't absorb light readily.
What can be done to ward off this encroaching epidemic?
Some physicians, probably not dermatologists, suggest spending about ten minutes a few times a week in the sun without sunscreen. Parents could threaten and cajole their children to drink fortified milk but this isn't always successful. Of course, the most obvious remedy is daily consumption of a calcium supplement containing vitamin D.
Strong Bones, Strong Body
Anyone who has had a broken bone knows that dealing with a cast is no fun. We’re offering something to help prevent that from happening.
BioActive Nutrients offers Calcium Citrate with Vitamin D, because Calcium is possibly one of the most important minerals in the body. Calcium Citrate is the form your body can most easily recognize and use, and the Vitamin D plays such a crucial role in carrying Calcium from the intestines to the blood.
The people most afflicted with a deficiency are the elderly, which is due to years of inadequate supplies of calcium in the diet, and lack of supplementation.
Children, women, and even men should consume the recommended daily intake to keep their entire body working efficiently and to ward off osteoporosis in the future.
Crucial Health endorses the use of Magnesium and Calcium together for optimal bone, teeth, muscle, skin and hair health. Pasteurized, homogenized dairy products do not supplement the needed nutrients. Adding supplemental D can cause the body to stop producing its own Vitamin D. The best source of D is sunshine. Crucial health recommends 15 minutes of sunshine on as much skin as possible every day. Go outdoors and get healthier!
