Calcium

[Guest guest]

> Does anyone have any great familiarity with the various forms

> of Calcium? I know there are 2 or 3 forms of it and one form

> is better than the others when it comes to absorption, but I

> am not sure which it is.

>

> Does anyone know?

The best kind is the kind you get from foods.

Calcium is an interesting thing. Current studies suggest that we really

shouldn't shoot for more than 500mg at a time when supplementing. Studies

have also found that absorption varies depending on many factors -- for

example, if you take zinc and calcium at the same time they may compete for

the same absorption sites. At the same time, there are some foods that

contain other nutrients which will AID the absorption of calcium.

Of course, most of the government and traditional material is all about milk

and dairy as the best way to get calcium. Kind of funny -- since OJ has

been supplemented with calcium, a lot of folks use that as their primary

source instead of milk and the dairy industry has actually launched a

campaign to regain market share.

The NIH has a campaign called " Milk Matters " that has some useful, although

basic information on calcium and the body (you can view it at

http://www.nichd.nih.gov/milk/milk.cfm if you like). From a strictly

foods-intake view they raise an interesting point -- specifically, issues of

bioavailability:

***************************************************

Bioavailability refers to how well the digestive system can absorb calcium.

This absorption depends on the overall level of calcium in a food and the

specific type of food being eaten. Foods differ in their ability to improve

or impair calcium absorption. For instance, the body is usually good at

absorbing calcium from dairy foods, which means the ioavailability of these

foods is high. The body is not very good at absorbing calcium from other

foods, like spinach, sweet potatoes, and beans, or from unleavened bread,

raw beans, seeds and nuts. The bioavailability of such foods is lower in

terms of calcium than milk or dairy products.

You need to eat larger amounts of foods with low bioavailability to get the

same level of calcium into your body. For example, you would have to eat 15½

cups of spinach to get the same amount of calcium that you get in one,

8-ounce glass of milk. You would need to eat 2½ cups of cooked soybeans to

get the same amount of calcium that you get in 1 cup of plain, fat-free

yogurt.

***************************************************

Of course, when I make a salad I could probably get that much spinach in

there anyway. :-P The information they present is interesting though!

Berkeley Wellness has a nice page for information on choosing a calcium

supplement and just calcium info in general. It's at

http://www.berkeleywellness.com/html/ds/dsCalcium.php and they, in short,

say to just go with good ole calcium carbonate. They have an article at

http://wellnessletter.com/html/ds/dsCoralCalcium.php that goes on to say

that coral calcium is no better than any other.

FWIW, HTH...!