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Thursday, March 10, 2011

Vitamin C For Type 2 Diabetes / How Much Is Enough and Why?

What role does Vitamin C play in type 2 diabetes? What kind and how much should you take? I have learned through research that Vitamin C is one of the safest nutrients you can take. A partial list of benefits include improved immune system deficiencies, preventing eye disease, cardiovascular disease, prenatal health problems,  wrinkling of the skin. and stroke. Vitamin C is also implicated in less chance of having a stroke, macular degeneration and reducing inflammation.

A study conducted by researcher Mark Moyad MD indicated that 500 mg of Vitamin C a day achieved the desired health benefits. This is opposed to the RDA recommendation of only 75-90 milligrams. He recommends taking a non-acidic buffered form of vitamin C and suggests 2000mg as the upper limit. I now use Ester C with bioflavonoids. I have switched from the Emergen C 1000mg packets primarily because of the cost, and now take 2500 to 3000mg of vitamin c daily from Ester C.

Here are some foods rich in Vitamin C:

  • Citrus fruits (Eat them and don't use store bought juice - too much concentrated sugar content)
  • Green peppers
  • Strawberries, pineapple
  • Broccoli
  • Sweet potatoes
  • Dark green leafy vegetables
  • Papaya
  • Cantaloupe
  • Mango
  • Watermelon (watch the sugar content)
  • Brussels sprouts
  • Cauliflower
  • Cabbage
  • Raspberries, blueberries
The above is only a partial list.

The following link gives interesting comment on the role of Vitamin C and explains how Vitamin C and Glucose compete for entry into our cells. As type 2 diabetics we end up deficient in vitamin C which might in part explain why we do NOT heal as quickly as a non-diabetic and also additional evidence of the negative effects of  (cells made by DuPont) through long term ingestion of hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated oils. The recommendation in the article is for a low carbohydrate diet with elimination of hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated oils and extra vitamin C intake.

Link to Vitamin C, hydrogenated oil Information

Excerpt from article:


Vitamin C Competes with Glucose For Insulin Pumps

"Diabetics are probably not absorbing other nutrients from the blood as well. Vitamin C is structurally similar to glucose and the vitamin has a short half-life in the blood stream.  It should concern medical professionals that vitamin C and glucose molecules share the same insulin-mediated tunneling mechanism into cells through the membrane.
In the 1970s, Emeritus Professor John T. A. Ely, University of Washington, proposed his Glucose-Ascorbate Antagonism (GAA) theory that predicts high glucose levels hinder vitamin C entry into cells. Animals which make their own vitamin C use dietary glucose as the raw material and the ascorbate and glucose molecules are similar. The similarity extends past molecular structure to the way they are attracted to, and enter, cells. Both molecules require help from the pancreatic hormone insulin before they can penetrate cell membranes using special "pumps." The name for the process that propels glucose and Vitamin C (the reduced form) through cell membranes is Insulin-mediated uptake.
Ely studied the insulin-mediated uptake of glucose and vitamin C using white blood cells. White blood cells have more insulin pumps and they may contain 20 times the amount of vitamin C as ordinary cells. Dr. Ely explains that both glucose and vitamin C molecules compete, but all things are not equal. The evolutionary "fight-or-flight" response favors glucose entry into cells at the expense of vitamin C. Because of this antagonism between sugar and Vitamin C, Ely recommends a low-carbohydrate, low-processed sugar diet.
Professor Ely told this author that he had advised Linus Pauling of the GAA theory and its prediction that Vitamin C would be less effective fighting colds in those who did not restrict their sugar intake. Recently, Ely and associates conducted a study on the common cold to test the GAA theory. Sugar and refined carbohydrates were restricted in the subjects. According to Dr. Ely, the remarkable (soon to be published) results showed an overwhelming preventive and curative property of vitamin C against the common cold in subjects with reduced sugar intake. (Presumably these subjects did not suffer the cellular membrane malfunction commonly diagnosed as Diabetes Type II).

The Diabetic Double Whammy

Combining these ideas, we postulate that cells that can't absorb glucose are not absorbing vitamin C either. As blood glucose levels rise, the GAA theory predicts that vitamin C uptake is greatly diminished throughout the body, even in cells with undamaged insulin pumps. Our conjecture is that the serious health consequences of prolonged Type II diabetes, e.g. blindness, wounds that won't heal, limb amputation, etc., are the result of the lack of vitamin C inside cells.
We may now more intelligently answer the question as to why heart patients do well on high-dose Omega-3 oil supplementation. Healthful omega-3 fatty acids, such as those found in flax seed and fish oils, promote healthy cell membranes allowing more nutrients to pass into cells. Theoretically, there would be more benefit from Omega-3 supplementation after the primary cause of membrane damage, trans fatty acids, are eliminated from the diet. As cell membranes become permeable, sugar molecules leave the blood stream lowering blood sugar, making vitamin C more bioavailable. Finally, we postulate that the cellular membrane problem hindering the uptake of glucose in diabetics also hinders their cells from obtaining vitamin C.
Heart patients, whose condition improves on Omega-3 oils, will improve even more as they eliminate processed foods, and follow Linus Pauling�s recommendation to increase their vitamin C dosage to individual bowel tolerance."

(MY INPUT) To me, this is fascinating information. It seems the more research I do, the more and more I run into the hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated oil concept, along with the PH miracle concept. The funny thing is, this is not conjecture, as those who have followed a low carbohydrate diet, who also eliminated as much as is humanly possible hydrogenated oils and started replacing those oils, with (extra virgin olive oil, flax oil, extra virgin coconut oil, krill oil supplementation etc.) were able to wean themselves off all their diabetic medications and live a normal life. I know, my third grade school teacher would not be happy with my run on sentence, but I think I made my point.

Remember a GOOD PLAN today beats a PERFECT plan tomorrow. WHY? Because tomorrow never comes - TODAY is all any of us have
Dan
     

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