Carrots and vitamin A overload

Jebus · Post by **Jebus** » Sat Oct 07, 2017 3:10 am

This morning I ate what I thought was an average size carrot. After weighing it (100 grams) I looked for the nutritional values at cronometer.com. That carrot, on it's own, brought me way above the maximum daily recommendation for Vitamin A.

I did a quick Google search and learned that vitamin A overload can lead to a bunch of health issues, including liver failure. Is this something we should take seriously? Should we not be eating carrots?

Sapphire Lightning · Post by **Sapphire Lightning** » Sat Oct 07, 2017 3:50 am

There is a difference between vitamin A (retinol/retinal) and Beta Carotene. You can OD on the "finished product" (aka retinol) but it is much harder to OD on Beta Carotene as your body needs to convert it. Sort of like how you can easily OD on heme iron, but plant based iron is much safer as your body does not absorb it so easily. Beta Carotene is a precursor to producing the active substance. From what I have read, you can not in practice (by eating whole foods) OD on beta carotene. Although you should do more research on your own, as I am of course not a doctor (duh).

brimstoneSalad · Post by **brimstoneSalad** » Sat Oct 07, 2017 4:12 pm

Sapphire Lightning got it.
Retinol is very dangerous, but Beta Carotene will only make your skin turn (temporarily) orange if you eat a lot of it. Your body won't poison itself by converting it into retinol you don't need.
It may be possible to OD somehow with supplements, but I don't believe it's possible with whole foods.

Gregor Samsa · Post by **Gregor Samsa** » Sat Oct 07, 2017 4:33 pm

I don't think there's ever been a case of someone OD-ing on beta-carotene.

Jebus · Post by **Jebus** » Sat Oct 07, 2017 11:33 pm

OK good. In that case, I wonder why Cronometer doesn't break down Vitamin A in the same way they do with vitamin B; B1, B2, B3 etc.

On another note i ran into the same problem with all B vitamins (except B12). After just sprinkling a little bit of nutritional yeast on my food Cronometer turned red.

Sapphire Lightning · Post by **Sapphire Lightning** » Sun Oct 08, 2017 4:32 am

Cronometer lets you set your own min/max values for each item. I suggest you look in to the WHO max for some of this stuff and change cronometer's values to those. AFAIK, there is no real "OD" for B vitamins as they are water soluble.

Jebus · Post by **Jebus** » Sun Oct 08, 2017 8:08 am

Sapphire Lightning wrote: ↑Sun Oct 08, 2017 4:32 am Cronometer lets you set your own min/max values for each item. I suggest you look in to the WHO max for some of this stuff and change cronometer's values to those. AFAIK, there is no real "OD" for B vitamins as they are water soluble.

From what I've read, too much B3 (niacin) could be a problem. I don't know what source Cronometer bases its values on. What makes you think WHO's values are better?

brimstoneSalad · Post by **brimstoneSalad** » Mon Oct 09, 2017 1:03 pm

They should. I don't know why they don't do it by default.
For reference, here's how to change it:
http://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=2054

Very high levels of niacin all at once can have side effects (niacin flush), but over the day I don't think it will.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2779993/
Extended release formulas for medical applications can be used to reduce flushing, and I don't think it's possible to create the effect from food (even nutritional yeast) due to slower absorption.

Carrots and vitamin A overload

Carrots and vitamin A overload

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