Selenium is far more beneficial than was once thought....
Today's Post: Tuesday, 4-26-2011
I’d read that the supplement selenium was a good antioxidant and that to some degree it had anticancer effects.
The standard stand-alone supplement is 200 mcg a day and many multi’s have 50 mcg.
If you eat wild caught fish a few times a week and nuts a few times a week you likely get about 15 to 50 mcg of selenium a day.
That’s enough. If you eat some and take some as a supplement, you’ll get about 250 mcg a day. The beneficial range is 50 to about 300 mcg a day.
In fact if you like Brazil nuts, you have to be careful not to eat too many. Each one has 100 mcg of selenium or more. So if you already take selenium, eating one Brazil nut occasionally is OK. But eating a handful several times a week will give you an overdose.
Selenium has great health benefits in the 50 to 300 mcg a day range. BUT taking more than that is NOT a good idea. In fact, at some point above that level of intake selenium is toxic.
So selenium is a supplement like vitamin B6 that has great health benefits but really has a level where more than the beneficial amount is a really BAD idea.
(B6 is great in the 25 to 75 mg a day range; but between 100 mg and 200 mg a day or more, you begin to get some nerve damage and numbness.)
Yesterday, Al Sears MD sent an email about selenium.
It seems that the right intake of selenium is even more beneficial than I had yet heard.
He first points out that single crop, factory style farms result in depleting the foods you eat from containing enough selenium. That means that most people who don’t take supplements or eat the foods high in selenium will be deficient and will NOT get its benefits.
1. He first said that this fact may be “one of the reasons why sperm counts are dropping everywhere.” ( A more recent reason is high cell phone use I’ve read.) The drop was already going on long before cell phones became heavily used. So Dr Sears is likely correct. (The pesticides used may also do some of the damage.)
“Selenium is essential for making sperm, and the male reproductive system depends on it. Your body has to have the right amount to stay fertile and potent.”
“In one study published a couple months ago, researchers took a group of infertile men and gave them 200 mcg of selenium and 400 IU of vitamin E every day. In just over three months, more than half the men made more sperm overall, and had more functioning and more mobile sperm.”
He goes on to say that this kind of farming grew at exactly the same time as this drop in sperm counts both in the United States and then in Europe. So it’s nice to have selenium supplements.
But men who want to father children need to find out they should take selenium! They might never have kids if they don’t take selenium.
2. If you dislike pain or restrictions on your mobility or you exercise regularly, selenium has another benefit that I’d never heard of. And it’s one you’ll value!
“A University of North Carolina study found that an increase of just one-tenth of a part per million of selenium in your body decreased their risk of osteoarthritis by 15 to 20 percent. The higher the amount of selenium, the more their risk dropped.”
That suggests that adding a 200 mcg a day selenium supplement may be a very important way to avoid osteoarthritis!
3. Another critical benefit I’d not heard of is this one:
“Have lots of energy and a strong metabolism – Selenium helps you make the critical thyroid hormones T3 and T4.”
If you hate feeling draggy all day or need lots of energy for your work, this could be a critical benefit.
Also, if you are trying to lose excess fat or would like to avoid gaining it, avoiding low thyroid is also a critical benefit to have. (This is especially true for women over 30 or 40.)
4. “Fight the effects of aging and live younger – Your body uses selenium to make glutathione peroxidase, a powerful antioxidant. “
Another supplement that boosts your level of glutathione is NAC, n-acetyl cysteine.
It’s not widely known; but a high level of glutathione tends to produce good health and a low level is found in people with poor health.
High levels of glutathione also help prevent mental decline.
So this benefit of selenium is also very important. And, until yesterday I’d not heard of it before.
5. Selenium also works well with vitamin D3 to keep your immune system able to protect you.
“Avoid illness and disease – More selenium helps your body make more of your strongest immune cells, killer T-cells.7 “
If you take selenium, you will have more of these front line troops against viruses and bacteria from the selenium. And we now know that enough vitamin D3 helps T-cells “see” invaders and triggers your T-cells to attack.
6. In fact, this increase in the effectiveness of your immune system from selenium and vitamin D3 may be why they tend to prevent cancers. Your T-cells kill off cancer cells as they appear and before they become established and become a cancer.
“Drop your risk of many kinds of cancer, including lung, liver, colon and most importantly for men, prostate cancer. “ was the last benefit of selenium that Dr Sears listed.
We now know why this is the case and that also taking 4,000 or more iu a day of vitamin D3 makes this more likely to occur.
I decided to list the research studies in his email for those interested.
(If you’d like to get his emails, see, http://www.alsearsmd.com .)
“[1] Greenwood-Robins, Maggie Ph.D. Foods That Combat Cancer, Avon Books, 2004, p 29-31
[2,4] Carlsen, E., Giwercman, A., Keiding, N. et al, "Evidence for decreasing quality of semen during past 50 years," BMJ Sept. 12, 1992;305(6854):609–613
[3] Moslemi, M.K., Tavanbakhsh, S.. "Selenium-vitamin E supplementation in infertile men: effects on semen parameters and pregnancy rate," Int. J. Gen. Med. Jan. 23, 2011;4:99-104
[5] Clark, L.C. et al, "Effects of selenium supplementation for cancer prevention in patients with carcinoma of the skin," JAMA Dec. 25, 1996;276(24):1957-63
[6] Williamson, David, “Study links low selenium levels with higher risk of osteoarthritis,” University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Nov 18, 2005
[7] Reid, M.E., Duffield-Lillico, A.J., Sunga, A., et al, “Selenium supplementation and colorectal adenomas: an analysis of the nutritional prevention of cancer trial,” Int. J. Cancer 2006; 118:1777–1781”
Today's Post: Tuesday, 4-26-2011
I’d read that the supplement selenium was a good antioxidant and that to some degree it had anticancer effects.
The standard stand-alone supplement is 200 mcg a day and many multi’s have 50 mcg.
If you eat wild caught fish a few times a week and nuts a few times a week you likely get about 15 to 50 mcg of selenium a day.
That’s enough. If you eat some and take some as a supplement, you’ll get about 250 mcg a day. The beneficial range is 50 to about 300 mcg a day.
In fact if you like Brazil nuts, you have to be careful not to eat too many. Each one has 100 mcg of selenium or more. So if you already take selenium, eating one Brazil nut occasionally is OK. But eating a handful several times a week will give you an overdose.
Selenium has great health benefits in the 50 to 300 mcg a day range. BUT taking more than that is NOT a good idea. In fact, at some point above that level of intake selenium is toxic.
So selenium is a supplement like vitamin B6 that has great health benefits but really has a level where more than the beneficial amount is a really BAD idea.
(B6 is great in the 25 to 75 mg a day range; but between 100 mg and 200 mg a day or more, you begin to get some nerve damage and numbness.)
Yesterday, Al Sears MD sent an email about selenium.
It seems that the right intake of selenium is even more beneficial than I had yet heard.
He first points out that single crop, factory style farms result in depleting the foods you eat from containing enough selenium. That means that most people who don’t take supplements or eat the foods high in selenium will be deficient and will NOT get its benefits.
1. He first said that this fact may be “one of the reasons why sperm counts are dropping everywhere.” ( A more recent reason is high cell phone use I’ve read.) The drop was already going on long before cell phones became heavily used. So Dr Sears is likely correct. (The pesticides used may also do some of the damage.)
“Selenium is essential for making sperm, and the male reproductive system depends on it. Your body has to have the right amount to stay fertile and potent.”
“In one study published a couple months ago, researchers took a group of infertile men and gave them 200 mcg of selenium and 400 IU of vitamin E every day. In just over three months, more than half the men made more sperm overall, and had more functioning and more mobile sperm.”
He goes on to say that this kind of farming grew at exactly the same time as this drop in sperm counts both in the United States and then in Europe. So it’s nice to have selenium supplements.
But men who want to father children need to find out they should take selenium! They might never have kids if they don’t take selenium.
2. If you dislike pain or restrictions on your mobility or you exercise regularly, selenium has another benefit that I’d never heard of. And it’s one you’ll value!
“A University of North Carolina study found that an increase of just one-tenth of a part per million of selenium in your body decreased their risk of osteoarthritis by 15 to 20 percent. The higher the amount of selenium, the more their risk dropped.”
That suggests that adding a 200 mcg a day selenium supplement may be a very important way to avoid osteoarthritis!
3. Another critical benefit I’d not heard of is this one:
“Have lots of energy and a strong metabolism – Selenium helps you make the critical thyroid hormones T3 and T4.”
If you hate feeling draggy all day or need lots of energy for your work, this could be a critical benefit.
Also, if you are trying to lose excess fat or would like to avoid gaining it, avoiding low thyroid is also a critical benefit to have. (This is especially true for women over 30 or 40.)
4. “Fight the effects of aging and live younger – Your body uses selenium to make glutathione peroxidase, a powerful antioxidant. “
Another supplement that boosts your level of glutathione is NAC, n-acetyl cysteine.
It’s not widely known; but a high level of glutathione tends to produce good health and a low level is found in people with poor health.
High levels of glutathione also help prevent mental decline.
So this benefit of selenium is also very important. And, until yesterday I’d not heard of it before.
5. Selenium also works well with vitamin D3 to keep your immune system able to protect you.
“Avoid illness and disease – More selenium helps your body make more of your strongest immune cells, killer T-cells.7 “
If you take selenium, you will have more of these front line troops against viruses and bacteria from the selenium. And we now know that enough vitamin D3 helps T-cells “see” invaders and triggers your T-cells to attack.
6. In fact, this increase in the effectiveness of your immune system from selenium and vitamin D3 may be why they tend to prevent cancers. Your T-cells kill off cancer cells as they appear and before they become established and become a cancer.
“Drop your risk of many kinds of cancer, including lung, liver, colon and most importantly for men, prostate cancer. “ was the last benefit of selenium that Dr Sears listed.
We now know why this is the case and that also taking 4,000 or more iu a day of vitamin D3 makes this more likely to occur.
I decided to list the research studies in his email for those interested.
(If you’d like to get his emails, see, http://www.alsearsmd.com .)
“[1] Greenwood-Robins, Maggie Ph.D. Foods That Combat Cancer, Avon Books, 2004, p 29-31
[2,4] Carlsen, E., Giwercman, A., Keiding, N. et al, "Evidence for decreasing quality of semen during past 50 years," BMJ Sept. 12, 1992;305(6854):609–613
[3] Moslemi, M.K., Tavanbakhsh, S.. "Selenium-vitamin E supplementation in infertile men: effects on semen parameters and pregnancy rate," Int. J. Gen. Med. Jan. 23, 2011;4:99-104
[5] Clark, L.C. et al, "Effects of selenium supplementation for cancer prevention in patients with carcinoma of the skin," JAMA Dec. 25, 1996;276(24):1957-63
[6] Williamson, David, “Study links low selenium levels with higher risk of osteoarthritis,” University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Nov 18, 2005
[7] Reid, M.E., Duffield-Lillico, A.J., Sunga, A., et al, “Selenium supplementation and colorectal adenomas: an analysis of the nutritional prevention of cancer trial,” Int. J. Cancer 2006; 118:1777–1781”
Labels: for men who want to father children, help reverse male infertility, new way to stay healthy, prevent cancer, prevent osteoarthritis, Selenium supplements are far more beneficial than was once thought
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