Calcium requirement is a sliding scale

Simple item page
dc.contributor.authorNordin, B.
dc.date.issued2000
dc.description.abstractIt must be a source of some surprise to rational scientists that the human requirement for calcium, an apparently inoffensive nutrient that contributes so much to our physical stability, arouses strong emotions in many breasts. Calcium requirements and allowances seem to attract more controversy and generate more heat than do the requirements and allowances for any other nutrient, the latest example of this being a recent controversy in the columns of the New York Times (1). The problem may be that calcium turnover is too slow and the effects of deprivation and replenishment too gradual to be easily demonstrated in humans; perhaps it is the very efficacy of the calcium homeostatic system that makes this system difficult to study. Whereas plasma concentrations of other nutrients (eg, sodium, potassium, phosphorus, and magnesium) can be lowered relatively easily and quickly by experimental deprivation (2), plasma (ionized) calcium is so well protected through access to the reserve stores in the skeleton that it cannot be used as a marker of calcium nutrition. Although there is overwhelming evidence that calcium deprivation causes osteoporosis in experimental animals (3), it would be both immoral and impractical to try to reproduce such experiments in humans. The calcium requirement therefore must be estimated by indirect means that, even if they satisfy many of the experts in the field, are open to criticism by others. Nonetheless, there is no smoke without fire and it may be that this controversy does reflect a deeper reality, although not perhaps the one that the critics of the calcium story envisage.
dc.description.statementofresponsibilityBE Christopher Nordin
dc.identifier.citationAmerican Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 2000; 71(6):1381-1383
dc.identifier.doi10.1093/ajcn/71.6.1381
dc.identifier.issn0002-9165
dc.identifier.issn1938-3207
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2440/32694
dc.language.isoen
dc.publisherAmer Soc Clinical Nutrition
dc.rights© 2000 American Society for Clinical Nutrition
dc.source.urihttp://ajcn.nutrition.org.proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/content/71/6/1381.full
dc.subjectAnimals
dc.subjectHumans
dc.subjectCalcium, Dietary
dc.subjectCalcium
dc.subjectNutritional Requirements
dc.subjectHomeostasis
dc.subjectNutrition Policy
dc.titleCalcium requirement is a sliding scale
dc.typeJournal article
pubs.publication-statusPublished

Files

Collections

Pathology publications