URINE ESSENTIAL ELEMENT

[Doris Izuwah]

Hi Dr,
What do you think of urine essential element? Does it give accurate levels of essential element in the body or rather the wastage of those elements ? Does blood element have an edge over it?. Also between whole blood element and red blood cell element, which one is more accurate and what is the significance of each over the other?.
For a child who has done urine essential element showing zinc levels of 621ug/g ( 63-688) and copper of 16.4 ug/g ( 4-11.4), will it be right to say that the ration of zinc to copper is 1:1.5 ? , if not , how is it calculated. Will it be right to say that this child has excess copper in the body or rather low copper in the body because it’s been wasted.

Thanks as i await your responce
Izuwah

[DrWoeller]

Doris,
If I am going to do blood test for minerals I would focus on the Red Blood Cell minerals (which gives a better idea of storage of minerals) and for Copper and Zinc focused on the Copper and Zinc profile, both of which come from Great Plains Laboratory. I have not relied on urine testing for absolute measurement of minerals as it can show wasting of minerals or easily influenced by supplementation. The Copper and Zinc scenario is complicated because copper is bound to a carrier protein called Ceruloplasmin which can be low normal or high and overall affect total and free copper levels. Personally, I don’t run that many urine metals tests anymore either as I am generally working off of hair samples. I will do urine metals if high dose oral DMSA or DMPS is being done or if intravenous forms of these medications are being used.

Dr. Woeller

[Author]

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