functional medicine and nutritional genomics - American Association ...

AAPI’S NUTRITION GUIDE TO OPTIMAL HEALTH: USING PRINCIPLES OF FUNCTIONAL MEDICINE AND NUTRITIONAL GENOMICS
17
Iodine: Why You
Need it, Why You
Can't Live Without
it
David Brownstein,
MD
I get asked by my patients if I had only one
natural item to treat my patients with, which would
it be? The answer to this question is not hard.
Though there are so many natural items that
provide such wonderful effects for the body, one
nutrient stands head and shoulders above the rest.
Can you guess which one it is?
Iodine.
In all my years of practicing medicine, I have yet
to see one item provide such miraculous effects
on the body as iodine does. This article will
illustrate the wonders of iodine and why you need
to take a close look at your supplement regimen
to ensure you are getting enough iodine in your
daily regime. I would like to dedicate this article
to my mentor on iodine, Dr. Guy Abraham. So,
how come you haven’t heard much about iodine?
That is because iodine is truly the most
misunderstood nutrient. There are so many myths
about iodine. This issue will tackle the two most
common myths about iodine:
157
Myth 1: We get enough iodine from salt.
Myth 2: Iodine supplementation will cause/worsen
thyroid disorders.
Because of these myths, people have the
mistaken idea that iodine is a toxic substance that
needs to be avoided. How prevalent are these
myths? They are repeated over and over in
conventional medicine as well as the media. I
guess if you repeat something over and over it
must be true—However, that is not the case. Let
me provide you with an email that was recently
forwarded to me. The email, sent by a
endocrinologist in the U.S., was forwarded to me
by a nurse who read my iodine book and wanted
to begin supplementing her patients with iodine.
‚We only see iodine deficiency in third world
countries. We have never seen it here in my past
eight years as a physician and the experience of
other endocrinologists that I know as well. So, I
don’t trust books and information that is out there.
Our salt is iodine fortified, so just eating a regular
diet, we get about 10-20x the amount of iodine
in the diet.‛
2012