The Study
Selenoprotein P as Biomarker of Selenium Status in Clinical Trials with Therapeutic Dosages of Selenite
This study found that when very sick patients got a lot of selenium through an IV, a protein in their blood called SELENOP went up — like a thermometer showing selenium levels. But it didn’t test if this helped them feel better or live longer.
Analysis score
Maximum 90 for a randomized controlled trial.
Where the score came from
Scientists tested if a protein in the blood called SELENOP can show when sick patients get very high doses of selenium through IV drips.
Where does this study sit?
Reviews of RCTs (Meta-analyses)
Max 100Randomized Trials
Max 90Reviews of Cohort Studies
Max 85Cohort Studies
Max 72Reviews of Case-Control Studies
Max 63Case-Control Studies
Max 58Cross-Sectional & Case Series
Max 50Expert Opinion
Max 568 / 100
Quality score
Participants are randomly assigned to treatment or control groups, minimizing bias. The gold standard for testing whether an intervention causes an effect.
Key takeaways
Summary
Based on the study abstract and findings.
- 1This means SELENOP can now be used like a fuel gauge for selenium therapy — even when doses are way above normal safety limits.
- 2When patients got more than 1 mg of selenium per day, SELENOP levels jumped from under 4 mg/L to over 10 mg/L in some cases — way higher than normal.
Score breakdown, methodology, conflicts of interest, evidence analysis & raw study data
Publication
Journal
Nutrients
Year
2020
Authors
O. Brodin, J. Hackler, Sougat Misra, Sebastian Wendt, Qian Sun, E. Laaf, C. Stoppe, M. Björnstedt, L. Schomburg
Related Content
Claims (6)
Chronic selenium toxicity occurs when a person consistently consumes more selenium than the body can process and eliminate through normal selenoprotein turnover.
Intravenous sodium selenite at doses greater than 1 mg per day in critically ill cancer and cardiac patients raises blood levels of selenoprotein P above 7 mg/L, with some measurements exceeding 10 mg/L, demonstrating that selenoprotein P responds to high selenium exposure in these patients.
In patients receiving high-dose intravenous selenite, selenoprotein P levels rise in proportion to baseline selenium in the blood, but this proportional relationship weakens over time due to biological limits in how much selenoprotein P can be produced.
When high doses of selenite are given intravenously, the types of selenoprotein P detected by Western blot do not change; the increase in total selenoprotein P is caused by more of the same protein variants being produced, not by new variants appearing.
In critically ill patients, high-dose intravenous selenite raises selenoprotein P levels regardless of the patient's age or sex.
Critically ill cancer and cardiac patients have lower levels of selenoprotein P in their blood before treatment compared to healthy people in Europe.
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a qualified healthcare professional before making health decisions.