How Much Calcium Do You Require? With Benefits

Calcium Is The Most Important Minerals In Our Body. We all know Calcium Is good for our Bone strengthening, and We can easily get Calcium from Milk and Milk Products. But Do you Know How much amounts of Calcium your body requires according to your age?  What are the other benefits of Calcium in our body? What are the other sources from where we can get Calcium in our daily diet?

If you want to know all these answers in detail, read this article completely.

Let's start by looking at What is CALCIUM? 

Calcium is the mineral that is present in our food and in our body, like other minerals like iron, potassium, sodium, etc. It is the same as other minerals, but its function, its requirement, its food source, and its availability in the body make it different from other minerals. More than 99% of the calcium in our body is present in the bones and teeth. this represents 40% of all minerals in the body. In an adult human body about 1000-1200g of calcium. This is a major mineral which is required more in our body. 

Other than Bone strengthening it has numerous OTHER ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS like- 

1. GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT - Calcium is important for forming and maintaining bones. It lends strength to the bones.  It is also important for the mineralization of our teeth.

2. ROLE IN BODY FLUIDS - Although there is very little calcium in the blood and other body fluids, it has an important role to play, and blood calcium levels are maintained within 9-11 mg/dl. Calcium also protects against hypertension.

3. BLOOD CLOTTING - Calcium participates in several reactions that help in forming fibrin, the main protein in a blood clot.

 

4. TRANSMISSION OF NERVE IMPULSES TO TARGET CELLS.

5. MUSCLE CONTRACTION - contractile protein actin and myosin interact when calcium concentration in a muscle cell increases. This leads to contraction. During muscle relaxation, the calcium is returned to the intracellular stores, and actin and myosin disconnect.

These are some other benefits of calcium, apart from Bone strengthening. Calcium is present in its most readily absorbable and usable form in milk and milk products. People who don't like to drink milk can get their calcium from an array of milk products like CURDS, CHEESE, and PANNER. 

Vegans, who avoid animal products can obtain it from other sources like cereals and millets, RAGI is the richest source, pulses especially soybean, are a rich source of calcium. Nuts like ALMONDS, seeds like SESAME (til) green leafy vegetables like MUSTARD GREEN and BROCCOLI, seafood like OYSTERS, and fish eaten with their bones are a good source of calcium. Nowadays, Calcium-fortified food is also available in markets. 

Till now we have covered other benefits of calcium and Other Sources of Calcium, Now we will look at the Recommended Dietary Intake Of calcium according to different ages- 

• Mens of all category = 600mg/day
• Women of all category = 600 mg/day.
• Lactating women = 1200 mg/day
• Pregnant women  =1200mg/day 
• Post- menopausal women = 800 mg/day. 
• Infants till 1 years = 500mg/ day.
• Children till 9 years  = 600mg/day 
• Adolescents 10 -17 years = 800mg/day. 

 We have covered all the categories and all the age groups and how much they require calcium in their body. If the daily intake is not meeting their RDA then they have a disease called OSTEOPOROSIS. 

Excess Consumption can lead to the formation of kidney stones. 

Health Tip - 1 glass (200ml)  of Milk( Cow / Buffalo ) will provide 236 mg of calcium.