The Nature of Nutrients

CHROMIUM unless dietary trends do an abrupt about-face, the world is heading for a dramatic increase in type 2 diabetes. According to the World Health Organization, the global caseload will more than double by 2025--to 300 million, up from 143 million in 1997. Want to avoid becoming a statistic? A good place to start is reducing your intake of white flour and sugar. But emerging evidence suggests you should also consider boosting your chromium.

Why? Scientists have long known that chromium is involved in sugar metabolism. Whenever your body mobilizes stored glucose, it requires chromium to do that. Now research is showing that the mineral may help diabetic and pre-diabetic patients boost their insulin sensitivity by increasing both the number of insulin receptors on cells and the activity of those receptors. "In almost every study where we gave chromium, we got better control of glucose with less insulin," says biochemist Richard Anderson at the USDA's Human Nutrition Research Center in Beltsville, Maryland.

Since we need only trace amounts of chromium, it should be easy to get enough from the diet. Yet research suggests that many of us are falling short--perhaps because we're eating so many refined carbohydrates. So try consuming more chromium-boosting broccoli, apples and other produce while cutting down on chromium-depleting sugar. As a fallback, consider a supplement of chromium picolinate. (Multivitamins contain chromium, but in a less absorbable form.) The current recommendation is 25 to 35 micrograms a day, but trials have used 200 or more.

POTASSIUM potassium gets almost no press, yet it's remarkably effective at lowering blood pressure--and even a 1 to 2 percent reduction translates into a reduced risk of strokes. Potassium also helps prevent kidney stones and heart arrhythmias. It even appears to benefit bones by neutralizing acids in the bloodstream that leach calcium from bone deposits. "Unless you have kidney disease, potassium is one of those things, like love and money, that you just can't get too much of," says University of Mississippi physiologist David B. Young.

The current guidelines call for 4,700 milligrams a day, but most people don't even get close. It's not that hard. A single cup of sweet potato has 950 milligrams. Four figs boast 540; a cup of cantaloupe, 500, and a glass of OJ, 450. "If you can consume 8,000 milligrams a day in your diet--the level we evolved to eat--chances are you'll get everything else you need, too," says Dr. Steven Pratt of San Diego's Scripps Memorial Hospital. That would include fiber and thousands of beneficial plant chemicals, such as the cancer-fighting compounds in broccoli.

In the end, there are few shortcuts to optimal health. Much as we would like to rely on pills, fitness requires regular exercise and a healthy diet--one that's rich in fruits, vegetables and whole grains, along with smaller amounts of fish, nuts and dairy. "The amazing thing is, the same dietary pattern helps everything from cancer to heart disease and diabetes," says Lichtenstein. There's no conundrum there. Bring on the vegetables.

© 2006