Nutritional Status and Anti-Nutrients

When people tell me that that their doctors tell them that taking supplements is a waste of money and only leads to expensive urine, I bristle, because as you will see, there are so many factors that need to be considered when it comes to how to make sure we are getting enough of the right nutrients at any given time.

Nutrient intake in the human body is affected by many factors including intake deficiency or insufficiency, optimal intake, or excessive intake. This is only part of the story though, since we need to understand the causes of FUNCTIONAL nutrient insufficiencies that take place when a person’s nutrient intake is misaligned with their nutrient status. Physiological nutritional requirements change from day to day depending on a person’s physiological status and so what might be considered as “normal” for one person could be completely different for another person depending on their overall health status and needs.

Some of the factors associated with this include:

• Poor nutrient absorption caused by:
• Poor eating habits
• Low stomach acid or pancreatic enzyme production
• Lack of other digestive factors like bile, intrinsic factor, etc
• Bowel transit time
• Genetic defects affecting nutrient viability – i.e. MTHFR, or lack of other activating enzymes
• Improper metabolism of nutrients to active transport forms
• Increased or decreased elimination and detoxication of nutrients
• Increased physiological need – i.e. high-performance athletics, pregnancy, recovering from illness or surgery, high stress
• Alterations in the gut microbiome including dysbiosis, infection, etc
• Intestinal permeability, aka leaky gut
• Overconsumption or underconsumption of foods or nutrients
• Obesity
• Drug or food induced nutrient interactions

When I do nutrient testing and review with my patients, we always talk about common reasons that cause malabsorption, deficiencies, and insufficiencies, dysbiosis and leaky gut, as well as the lack of ability to activate nutrients in the body (often related to genetic mutations). What I often forget to talk about is all the anti-nutrients that a person may be consuming that are literally stealing nutrients from their bodies and that is what I want to discuss here.

DRUG - NUTRIENT DEPLETION

I could write an entire article regarding the list of common drug-induced nutrient depletions but will mention a few of the important and common ones here and invite you to look at the end of this article for links to other posts and lists that you can access. I also have a list available at the office if you would like one.

The most common drugs that I would look into includes, all the acid suppressing drugs, especially PPIs (the azoles – omeprazole, etc), antibiotics, oral birth control pills, cholesterol lowering drugs, and anti-hypertensive medication. The list is much longer, but these are some of the most common ones that are widely prescribed.

• Acid suppressing drugs:
• Minerals – Iron, Phosphorous, copper, zinc, magnesium, and calcium
• Vitamins - B1, B3, B6, B12, C, D, folate, K, and beta-carotene
• Antibiotics:
• Minerals – Potassium, Zinc, magnesium, copper, iron
• Vitamins – A, beta carotene, B1, B6, B12, folate, D, K
• Oral Contraceptives:
• Minerals – magnesium, selenium, zinc
• Vitamins – B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, folate, B12, C, CoQ10,
• Cholesterol lowering drugs:
• Minerals – iron, calcium, copper
• Vitamins – A, E, CoQ10, K, beta-carotene, B12, folate, D
• Anti-hypertensives:
• Minerals – magnesium, potassium, zinc
• Vitamins – B1, B6, folate, C, CoQ10

FOOD ANTI-NUTRIENTS

What is less known or thought about is the fact that consuming foods and drinks can also be a big cause of nutrient depletion. Below is a list of some of the worst offenders to consider.

• Highly processed foods: usually high in fat, sugar and often fortified with extra “nutrients” such as folic acid, iron, sodium, phosphorus, etc.
• Soda – especially “colas”, have phosphorus to help make them fizzy and delicious, but this phosphorus – which is essential to biologic functioning, has to bind to its counterpart in the body, calcium. Consuming even one cola soda daily can lead to excess loss of calcium in the body and we are seeing osteopenia found in adolescents and teens now as a result of high soda consumption. This could also be one of the causes of increased osteoporosis in adults.
• Processed baked goods including bread, crackers, cereals, etc – these are almost all fortified with iron (usually iron shavings that are not absorbable as a usable form of iron), folic acid (can cause many difficulties with folate metabolism, especially in the 60% of the population that has one or more of the MTHFR mutations, where they may not be able to convert folic acid to methyl folate and the folic acid can actually block folate from getting into the cells), sodium (which needs to bind with chloride and can cause upsets in this balance), as well as many others.
• Fast foods – often made with very cheap or contaminated ingredients and usually includes the substances already mentioned elsewhere. The quality of your food matters and eating this kind of food occasionally as a treat or a convenience is probably okay, but I would pay attention to the sources of the products you are consuming, i.e. conventionally raised beef or chicken that is full of antibiotics, hormones, and are raised and butchered in very inhumane ways. Is this really something you want to be putting into your body?? See the link below for some suggestions, not all of which I agree with, but at least it’s a starting point.
• Foods made with trans fats, some saturated fats, or high in omega 6 Fatty acids –
• Trans fats are manmade fats were originally thought to be a good alternative to saturated fats and were then found to be very inflammatory and to be a big cause of heart disease and obesity. These fats are mostly being removed from the food supply but are still out there – look for anything with hydrogenated oils or other sneaky and clever names and avoid them like the plague!
• Omega 6 fatty acids includes seed oils like safflower, vegetable oils, but also are in all grains. These fats are indeed necessary for the body, but as I explained in my post about omega 3 FAs, most Americans eat way too many of these and they tend to be pro-inflammatory, and can be one of the root causes of inflammation at a cellular level. A good ratio to look for is about 4 Omega 6 FAs to 1 Omega 3 FA to help keep a good anti-inflammatory profile.
• High saturated fat diet – eating many fast foods which are high in saturated fats can then cause nutritional depletion because of the way the body uses up nutrients to process and digest these fats. NOT ALL saturated fat is bad however, and getting healthy amounts of good fats is critical for good health.
• Sugary drinks and foods –
• White sugar has been largely stripped of most of the nutrients it might have possessed in its natural plant form, and as such it can lead to nutrient depletion because of what the body needs to do to process and digest it. It also leads to dehydration, because the large intestine has to add additional water to help balance the osmolarity and so you lose water that would normally be reabsorbed back into the body thru the colon.
• High fructose corn syrup – the cheap alternative to cane sugar and many, many times sweeter than cane sugar and this is literally like a bomb to your liver because of how much it takes to process it. This easily and effectively becomes a triglyceride which then stores as fat in the body and directly leads to obesity.

• Alcohol – essentially processed as sugar in the body, but also requires a lot of work by the liver to metabolize it and thus uses up many nutrients to do this. Alcohol is another substance that human beings have been consuming probably forever, and its not to say that no one should ever consume this, because it is built into our social and human fabric of life. However, we know that from a health perspective, even more than 1 drink daily for women and 2 drinks daily for men, can cause serious consequences to one’s health and wellbeing. Some of the ways in which alcohol affects nutrient absorption includes:
• Decreasing secretion of digestive enzymes from the pancreas
• Impairing nutrient absorption by damaging the cells lining the stomach and intestines (leaky gut)
• Disabling transport of some nutrients into the blood
• Preventing nutrients that are absorbed from being fully utilized by altering their transport, storage, and excretion
• Minerals affected – calcium, magnesium, iron and zinc
• Vitamins affected – all the B vitamins, but especially B12, B2, B3, as well as vitamin A, C, E, D and K
• Alcohol also disrupts the body's microbiome and can be another cause of dysbiosis

• Caffeine – has been used by human beings for 1000s of years and for many is a wonderful part of their daily life. However, like all good things, its not too hard to do it to excess, which does have nutritional consequences to the body’s physiology. If you love caffeine and can tolerate it, then it could be fine, but like all things, moderation is the key!
• Sources of caffeine includes:
• Coffee, Expresso, Tea – green or black, soda, chocolate, guarana, energy drinks, supplements
• Genetics plays an important part in the metabolism of caffeine and we all know there are people who can drink an expresso at 10 pm and still fall asleep easily as well as the person who could drink one cup of regular coffee in the morning and not be able to sleep at all that night. You have to figure out where you are on this spectrum to make sure that you are not disrupting your sleep, which is critical to good health. Other negative side effects of caffeine include nervousness, anxiety, and palpitations.
• Because of its diuretic affect, caffeine can lead to loss of water-soluble vitamins such as B vitamins and vitamin C.
• High consumption of caffeine can interfere with vitamin D and calcium absorption

While this is certainly not an exhaustive list, it does give you enough information to get started and will hopefully help you to start making some better choices. I hope you find these articles helpful.

With blessings,

Dr Carey

Online references to check out:

Drug-Induced Nutrient Depletion Chart - InVite Health Blog

Drug-Induced Nutrient Depletion Handbook by Ross Pelton | Open Library

DRUG-NUTRIENT DEPLETION AND INTERACTION CHARTS (chiro.org)

Alcohol's Effect on Nutrition (verywellmind.com)

Caffeine | The Nutrition Source | Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

10 Healthiest Fast Food Restaurants and Chains - The Teal Mango