Should you be taking more fat-busting-muscle-building chromium? Health and nutrition expert johnny Bowden advises...

I had just put the finishing touches on an article which discussed the frustration so many people feel when faced with contradictory recommendations in the areas of nutrition and supplements, when what should arrive in the post but the new issue of Nutrition Reviews, a well-respected professional journal of scientific articles. It featured a special article about the effects of chromium on body composition and weight loss.

Now, chromium, as you may know, has become something of a star on the supplement playing field, touted for its supposed abilities to help us grow muscle and lose fat. It’s one of the supplements I am asked about most. I turned to the article, eager to see what the author – Dr. Richard Anderson, lead scientist of the Nutrient Requirements and Functions Lab at the Human Nutrition Research Center of the Department of Agriculture – had to say.

The study was what they call a research review that examines a lot of published studies and tries to find some patterns and draw conclusions. Here’s what this article found: Of the 14 studies this doctor surveyed, seven showed that chromium supplements significantly improved body composition (either by increasing lean body weight or decreasing body fat or both). Six showed that the supplements had no effects, and one study was equivocal.

But then Dr. Anderson did something interesting. He looked at some of the studies that showed ‘no effect’ a little more carefully. In three of those original six studies, the researchers also couldn’t find any effect on body composition from strenuous weight training. As one of my workout buddies says, that’s like not being able to find your bum if you put a bell on it. In other words, if those studies were showing that strenuous weight training didn’t make any difference in body composition, maybe the designs of the studies themselves were flawed.

In another of the ‘no effect’ studies, Dr. Anderson noted that the subjects were 19-to-20-year-old male athletes and the amount of chromium given may well have been too little to produce an effect.

Here’s the point: A study is only as good as its methods, and all studies are not created equal. Well-meaning researchers are always reviewing these things, looking at what might have been missed, and re-doing them trying to tease out new information. But if you’ve got an agenda, well, just like in politics – which the nutrition field increasingly resembles – you can pretty much always find some study to prove your point.

What studies do is add to the body of available information.

What they don’t do, necessarily, is increase understanding.

So let’s think about chromium objectively. Chromium helps insulin do its job more effectively. It reduces insulin insensitivity, which is closely connected with obesity, and is profoundly involved with the regulation of blood sugar, insulin and glucose metabolism. It is considered one of the least toxic nutrients. There have been absolutely no confirmed negative effects of chromium in nutritional studies. And most people don’t get nearly enough in their diet.

So, should you take chromium supplements?

Look at the balance sheet. You could wait for more studies, or you could go with a hunch. Downside? Upside?

As always, you be the judge.

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