[NancyM]

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/?p=305
A snippet

The patient was a 47 year old man who had undergone gastric bypass surgery four years earlier and had then lost about 100 pounds. Two years after the gastric bypass the patient had developed a hernia, a fairly common occurrence after abdominal surgery. He underwent another operation to repair his hernia after which he developed a serious infection.

He needed weeks of intravenous antibiotics, and he was still living with the consequences: the incision that the doctors made to repair the hernia never healed. It remained an open wound, and no one could figure out why. That wasn’t the only mystery: six months ago, routine blood work showed that he had developed anemia (too few red blood cells) and neutropenia (too few infection-fighting white blood cells). He had a slew of tests, but no one could explain this newest complication either.

His blood work showed that he had fewer than 2,000 white cells per microliter of blood — less than half the number he should have had, even without an infection. The neutrophils — the type of white blood cells that serve as the front line of the immune system, our body’s version of the Marine Corps — were below 500 cells per microliter, an inadequate force to fight off even the most insignificant infection.

This patient’s doctor racked her brain and her medical books to come up with some reason for his immune problem. She rightly figured that people don’t just develop a disorder like this for no reason: something had to be causing it. As it turned out, there was a cause, and it came from an unlikely source: the patient’s own physicians.

The patient’s wife brought all his nutritional supplements to the hospital so he could continue taking them. His surgeons had started him on a regimen of vitamins and minerals to help the healing process after his surgery, and the patient had continued to take these supplements since, even during his subsequent hospitalizations for his recurrent infections.

In going over the patient’s list of supplements his doctor noted that along with his multivitamin that patient was taking extra vitamin A and zinc. In fact, he had been taking 10 times the recommended amount of vitamin A and 15 times the recommended amount of zinc. His doctor read up on these supplements and learned that excess zinc could cause all the problems that her patient was suffering, not because of the excess zinc itself, but because of the copper deficiency the excess zinc causes.

Zinc and copper are absorbed through the same ionic channel, and when there is an overabundance of zinc it gets absorbed instead of the copper. Think of a turnstile leading into a stadium. If there are an equal number of people with green shirts and yellow shirts outside the stadium pushing toward the turnstile, both will get in at about the same rate. If suddenly a bus dumps of a crowd of people with green shirts who then outnumber the yellow shirts by a factor of 20 to 1, there will be way fewer yellow-shirted people who make it through the turnstile.

[jccgf]

Thanks for the post, Nancy. It is an important reminder. I learned of the copper/zinc balance because of my daughter who tested high copper/low zinc.... and she needs extra zinc, and no copper, because she has pyroluria. But that is a special circumstance.

Zinc is one of those things that can be overdone, and any higher than recommended dosing should be recommended and monitored by a doctor.

Here is a product that builds in the copper/zinc balance...not a bad idea if taking extra zinc.
http://www.iherb.com/store/ProductDe...&pid=NOW-01510

Here is a thread that MrsD has on zinc, for additional information.
http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/showthread.php?t=4410

I've found things I've read about zinc very interesting, and my daughters symptoms where in line with zinc deficiency. Zinc is important to the gut, too. Somewhere I have something on that...but don't have time to look for it now.

Cara

[NancyM]

It was interesting that chelated zinc/copper gets into the blood by a different route.

What I was thinking of was all these "cold" products out now with zinc. It really has become the supplement du jour. And if you think about it, when you've got a cold you really need the white blood cells around, if you're copper deficient because you take zinc, you could be in for a longer cold.

Also, I found the hints about copper deficiency interesting. I'm nuts for nuts and probably get at least 1 oz (more most likely) every day. I just read an article about how the EFA profile in nuts is so ideal, and now this about copper. I guess I shouldn't beat myself up over eating nuts.

[jccgf]

I agree, extra zinc is promoted a lot during cold and flu season, and there are always those who think more is better, or don't consider too much could cause harm, or don't stop to think to add up all their sources of it.


Cara