The history behind chromium, an essential
mineral
Since the 1950s, it’s been known that trivalent chromium
is a trace mineral needed by the body in order for insulin to
properly use glucose. It wasn’t until April 1977, when Toronto
General Hospital’s Khursheed N. Jeejeebhoy, Ph.D., published
a landmark study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
that chromium was firmly established as critical for human health.
In this study, when a patient, who had been receiving total parenteral
nutrition (TPN) feedings for over five years, was given chromium
in her intravenous feedings, her symptoms of chromium deficiency
and blood-sugar imbalance were all “corrected or restored
to their previous levels.” These findings influenced the
U.S. Food and Nutrition Board to designate chromium as “essential
for human health.”
Insulin, which is truly a master hormone of our metabolism,
keeps glucose levels balanced, regulates the body’s utilization
of carbohydrates, fats and protein for energy, and is thought
to directly affect certain genetic metabolic processes. Overall,
chromium helps the body’s tissues respond efficiently
to insulin. Unfortunately, however, people tend to lose chromium
as they age, after strenuous exercise, and after eating high
sugar foods.
The typical American diet, high in refined foods such as flour
and sugar, supplies little chromium. In addition, many Americans
tend not to eat foods rich in chromium, such as organ meats,
mushrooms, broccoli, brewer’s yeast, brown rice, cheese,
meat and wheat germ.
The average American only gets 35 mcg a day of chromium (which
is the Dietary Reference Intake, or DRI). A person would need
to eat as much as 12 turkey legs or 50 egg bagels each day to
get the USDA’s recommended daily intake (Reference Daily
Intake, or RDI) set for chromium of 120 mcg. Considering that
the clinical body of evidence suggests that 200 to 400 mcg per
day are needed to achieve optimal health benefits, the DRI may
prove inadequate, especially in people who are insulin resistant.
Establishing baselines & determining bioavailability
of chromium
Researchers from Harvard University’s School of Public
Health are currently conducting a study that should provide
baseline results determining and comparing chromium levels
in healthy people and in people with diabetes using what is
perhaps the body’s most reliable gauge—the levels
of chromium present in a person’s toenails. These results,
and others available this year, should provide better clinical
and therapeutic baselines and bioavailability measurement guides
that will influence our future research efforts. Future initiatives
will provide a better understanding of why, for example, certain
groups of people respond very well to chromium supplementation
(women) while others don’t respond as dramatically (elite
athletes). Upcoming US Department of Agriculture (USDA)-sponsored
studies will also provide even further corroboration as to the
greater efficacy and bioavailability of chromium picolinate
over other forms of this essential mineral. |
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