What is the significance of AAA Ca 'absorbability"?One of the big problems with calcium supplementation is thatcalcium is a mineral and it is difficult to absorb. Much of the calcium taken as supplements simply goes through the digestive system and winds up in the toilet. Other supplements are absorbed but they never make it to bone formation. Instead calcium deposits are made in joints and eventually contribute to the aches and pains of our older years.
What is necessary to repair the damage of thin or porous bone, is that the calcium is absorbed and utilized in bone formation. THAT is what Fujita's specially treated oyster shell and seaweed seems to do.
Perhaps it would helpful to allow Dr. Fujita to speak to AAA Ca {Advacal) himself. Here are some abstracts:
The first outlines the reasons why these studies have been so important:
Osteoporosis International . 1997;7 Suppl 3:S6-9. Osteoporosis is an old and continuing problem which has been a challenge to medical research and care throughout the history of mankind. After the break-through with estrogen, many new agents as well as nutritional and physical interventions were found to be effective in preventing and controlling osteoporosis.
Calcium represents one of the keys to all these methods, especially with the appearance of new highly biologically available forms influencing cell calcium metabolism. It appears to be important to focus our attention not only on the physical properties and strength of bone but also on its calcium storage function. By controlling osteoporosis and restoring the proper calcium storage function of the bone, many diseases of old age which are due to or exacerbated by calcium deficiency and disturbed calcium distribution in the body, such as hypertension, arteriosclerosis and senile dementia, may also be successfully controlled.
The second study outlines some of the differences between the situation in Japan and the United States and Europe. These differences explain in part some of the reasons why T. Fujita and his colleagues have spent so much time studying forms of calcium, while researchers elsewhere have concentrated on the effectiveness of hormone replacement therapy and other pharmaceuticals:
In Japan, unlike in the United States and Europe, where osteoporosis is synonymous with post menopausal osteoporosis, the need for treatment of osteoporosis has been emphasized only for elderly women with established disease. This may be because women in the immediate post menopausal period in Japan are virtually free of symptoms such as lumbago and signs such as spinal compression fracture.
Osteoporosis typically does not manifest itself until about age 65; therefore, post menopausal osteoporosis with vertebral fracture below the age of 60 is quite rare in Japan. Unique features of treatment for osteoporosis in Japan include rare use of estrogen replacement therapy, common use of vitamin D derivatives (especially 1alpha(OH) vitamin D) without notable side effects, and use of calcitonin almost exclusively in a low-dose intermittent regimen (20 U/week). Similarly, the use of ipriflavone is common, and calcium supplementation, especially with an active absorbable algae calcium with high bioavailability (AAACa), is effective and popular. The emphasis on the use of calcium, vitamin D, and calcitonin in the treatment of osteoporosis may be explained by an extremely low dietary calcium intake in Japan.
Other factors that favor reliance on the calcium-focused approach and avoidance of estrogen include a fatalistic and naturalistic view toward menopause; an uneasiness with hormone replacement therapy; an older female population who seek osteoporosis treatment because of uneventful immediate post menopausal periods; and the efficient absorption of calcium from the intestine with favorable response to exogenous vitamin D due to a long-standing calcium deficiency and possibly a low incidence of vitamin D-receptor abnormalities.
Third. One of the results of results of the differences between the Japanese population starting treatment for Osteoporosis and those in the USA and Europe is age. It used to be somewhat of a truism that the older you are, the more difficult it is to increase bone density. But Fujita's studies have challenged that assumption.
Here is a study done on hospitalized 80 year olds (Since they are hospitalized they are certainly not doing 'bone density exercises"!).
Calcif Tissue Int. 1996 Apr;58(4):226-30 by Fujita T, Ohue T, Fujii Y, Miyauchi A, Takagi Y. Calcium Research Institute, Osaka, Japan.
A randomized, prospective, double-blind test was carried out to compare the effects of heated oyster shell-seaweed calcium (AAA Ca), calcium carbonate, and placebo in 58 elderly, hospitalized women with the mean age of 80 divided into three groups. Group A received 900 mg/day Ca as AAA Ca, Group B 900 mg/day Ca as CaCO3, and Group C placebo besides regular hospital diet containing approximately 600 mg Ca/day for 24 months. From the 25th to the 30th month, all groups were given AAA Ca. Lumbar spine and radial bone mineral density (BMD) were measured at 3-month intervals. Urinary Ca/Cr and serum alkaline phosphatase, intact and midportion serum parathyroid hormone (PTH), and calcitonin were also measured at intervals.
From the 6th to the 24th month of the study, the ratio of lumbar spine BMD (L2-L4 by DPX, Lunar) to the basal pretest value was consistently and significantly higher in Group A than Group C but not higher in Group B than in Group C. PTH, measured 12 months after the beginning of the study, was lower in Group A than in Group C, but no significant difference was found between Groups B and C.
At 3 months after the placebo was switched to AAA Ca in Group C, serum PTH was significantly decreased from the level during placebo supplement. Morning urine Ca/Cr decreased in Groups A after 18 months and in B after 12 months, but not in C. Serum alkaline phosphatase decreased in Group A significantly compared with Group C, but not in Group B. AAA Ca appears to be effective for increasing BMD in elderly subjects.
(Note the carefulness of the concluding sentence! Nothing like a hyped up advertiser. Advacal uses scientific languages)
