My dialysis team dietician recently provided me a resourse that suggests eating just one Brazil nut per day can help to raise your Albumin. The resourse states in part:
“You can think of albumin as your body’s mail carrier — it delivers nutrients, vitamins, minerals and energy you get from food to the rest of your body. It also helps the fluid you drink stay in your cells and blood vessels, and it helps fight infection.
You need more albumin when you are on dialysis. When your kidneys are not working properly, both hemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis remove the buildup of waste and fluid in your blood. But dialysis also removes some of the albumin in your blood. This is why it is important for people on dialysis to have a protein source at every meal and sometimes with snacks.
Albumin helps fluid stay in your blood vessels, something that is especially important when you are on dialysis because you are not going to the bathroom like you used to. Dialysis pulls the extra fluid out of your blood, and albumin helps keep fluid in your blood — instead of pooling around your feet and ankles or around your lungs — so dialysis can remove it more easily and it causes less stress on the rest of your body.”
As you can easily ascertain from the lead graphic from recent lab results, I am deficient in Albumin. I went to Amazon and bought a two pound bag of Brazil nuts for $21.98 and am eating one per day. We’ll see what the results are in my labs. I quizzed Perplexity about the benefits of eating one Brazil nut for dialysis patients with the following results:
Based on the search results provided, here is why a dialysis patient should eat one Brazil nut per day:
Benefits of Brazil Nuts for Dialysis Patients
- Selenium Source: Brazil nuts are an excellent source of selenium, containing about 96 micrograms per nut, which is 175% of the recommended daily intake. Selenium is vital for proper thyroid function and overall health, but dialysis patients often have low selenium levels. 134
- Antioxidant and Anti-inflammatory Effects: Brazil nuts contain antioxidants and have been shown to reduce oxidative stress and inflammation in dialysis patients. This can help slow the progression of chronic kidney disease. 24
- Improved Glutathione Peroxidase Activity: Supplementation with one Brazil nut per day has been found to increase the activity of the antioxidant enzyme glutathione peroxidase in dialysis patients. This helps protect against oxidative damage. 4
- Potential Cardioprotective Effects: The healthy fats, fiber, and antioxidants in Brazil nuts may help improve cholesterol levels and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, which is a major concern for dialysis patients. 35
- Thyroid Support: The high selenium content in Brazil nuts can help support proper thyroid hormone production, which is important for dialysis patients who often have thyroid dysfunction. 3
In summary, the unique nutrient profile of Brazil nuts, especially their exceptionally high selenium content, makes them a beneficial dietary addition for dialysis patients to help manage oxidative stress, inflammation, and other complications associated with chronic kidney disease. Eating one Brazil nut per day is recommended. 124
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