{"id":2066,"date":"2006-12-11T08:49:02","date_gmt":"2006-12-11T14:49:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/?p=2066"},"modified":"2021-03-22T21:51:08","modified_gmt":"2021-03-23T02:51:08","slug":"most-common-deficiencies-zinc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/blog\/2006\/12\/11\/most-common-deficiencies-zinc","title":{"rendered":"Most Common Deficiencies: Zinc"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Click <a href=\"http:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/newsletters\/061211\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">here<\/a> for the Health Tip link.<\/p>\n<p>A popular blood test in our office measures levels of vitamins, minerals,<br \/>\nand antioxidants. It seems reasonable that as long as you\u2019re spending good<br \/>\nmoney on nutritional supplements, you might as well see if they\u2019re being<br \/>\nabsorbed. It\u2019s also helpful that some health insurance companies (notably,<br \/>\nBlue Cross) are covering the test.<\/p>\n<p>Interestingly, the three most common deficiencies appearing in our patients<br \/>\nare vitamin D, vitamin E, and zinc. The first is no surprise at all.<br \/>\nChicago is a dim and cloudy city once summer ends, and sunshine is needed<br \/>\nfor your skin to manufacture vitamin D. I\u2019ve written a lot about the<br \/>\nimportance of vitamin D in previous health tips, and urge all women to take<br \/>\n1000-2000 IU (international units) daily. A recent article on vitamin D<br \/>\nlinked low levels to an increased susceptibility to cancer of the pancreas.<br \/>\nYikes.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019ll write about vitamin E another time, but since the cold and flu season<br \/>\nare upon us, this seems like a good time to discuss zinc.<\/p>\n<p>Zinc is a mineral vital to the healthy functioning of more than 300 enzymes<br \/>\nand hormones in the human body. One of the most significant of these is<br \/>\nsuperoxide dismutase (SOD), among the most potent of antioxidants. Low<br \/>\nlevels of SOD have been linked to reduced lifespan in lab animals and<br \/>\nsusceptibility to degenerative conditions like ALS (Lou Gehrig\u2019s disease)<br \/>\nand Parkinson\u2019s.<\/p>\n<p>But equally important, zinc is vital to the healthy function of our immune<br \/>\nsystems. This has been known for years, and you\u2019ve probably seen cold<br \/>\ncapsules and throat lozenges with added zinc. No shortage of clinical<br \/>\ntrials has proven that if you take zinc at the first sign of a cold, the<br \/>\nduration of your infection will be shortened significantly.<\/p>\n<p>Zinc is also involved with normal cell function and growth. Most<br \/>\ninfertility centers, when they see a man with a low sperm count, will<br \/>\nquickly check his zinc level and start him on zinc supplementation to ramp<br \/>\nup his numbers.<\/p>\n<p>There are several definitely annoying aspects of zinc deficiency:<br \/>\n\u2022    People who are wisely cutting back on their red meat consumption<br \/>\naren\u2019t thrilled to learn the best source of zinc is beef.<br \/>\n\u2022    The cereals, nuts, and legumes that represent a big part of a<br \/>\nhealthful diet actually block your intestine\u2019s ability to absorb zinc.<br \/>\n\u2022    Because of the steady depletion of good minerals from our farmland,<br \/>\nthe amount of zinc in green vegetables has dropped during the past fifty<br \/>\nyears.<\/p>\n<p>With this information, do I recommend you add yet another supplement to<br \/>\nyour daily regimen? Not really.<\/p>\n<p>Keep a bottle of zinc lozenges to use at the first sign of a cold, but stop<br \/>\nonce your cold is history. For everyday zinc coverage, make sure your high<br \/>\npotency multivitamin\/mineral supplement has at least 12.5 mg of zinc to<br \/>\nkeep you from developing any deficiency.  This multiple in our apothecary<br \/>\nwill keep you covered.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Click here for the Health Tip link. A popular blood test in our office measures levels of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. It seems reasonable that as long as you\u2019re spending good money on nutritional supplements, you might as well see if they\u2019re being absorbed. It\u2019s also helpful that some health insurance companies (notably, Blue Cross) [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2087,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3,43,281],"tags":[210,279,275,280,282],"class_list":["post-2066","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","category-knowledge-base","category-nutrition-nutritional-supplements-vitamins-herbal-remedies","category-z","tag-antioxidants","tag-coldsflus","tag-immune-system-support","tag-sod","tag-zinc"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\r\n<title>Most Common Deficiencies: Zinc - WholeHealth Chicago<\/title>\r\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\r\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/blog\/2006\/12\/11\/most-common-deficiencies-zinc\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Most Common Deficiencies: Zinc - WholeHealth Chicago\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Click here for the Health Tip link. A popular blood test in our office measures levels of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. It seems reasonable that as long as you\u2019re spending good money on nutritional supplements, you might as well see if they\u2019re being absorbed. 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