Latest concerns about Vitamin D deficiency. Check it out.

Check it out. Latest concerns about Vitamin D deficiency. BBC News reports that there has been an increase in childhood rickets over the past 15 years. "The chief medical officer for England, Dame Sally Davies, is to contact medical staff about concerns young children and some adults are not getting enough vitamin D. Government guidelines recommend some groups, including the under-fives, should take a daily supplement. However, recent research found that many parents and health professionals were unaware of the advice."

As well as the short video on that webpage, I believe you will find this one from a news report earlier this month even more interesting/alarming. That most health professionals are ill-informed in the matter of the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency is perhaps the most alarming aspect of the problem.

Taking vitamin D3 supplements certainly made a big difference to me: enabled me to rise from a chair without a monumental struggle was perhaps the most noticeable difference, and the ability to climb stairs more easily, and of course to feel stronger, and steadier on my feet. All my life doctors had given me the wrong information about vitamin D. Especially Dr Nigel Bax - now a professor, I believe. Although my chest X-ray at the time I saw him caused him to exclaim with shock that my ribs were almost transparent on the X-ray, he did his damnedest to warn me off taking vitamin D, and said if I did take any supplements, against his advice, the best time to take them was on an empty stomach before breakfast! - That too, was wrong. Fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, E, K) should be taken with or after a meal that contains healthy fat. His confident, strongly expressed, incorrect advice did me immeasurable harm. - I had osteomalacia. No wonder my ribs were hurting.

Do you still need to be convinced about the benefits of Vitamin D supplements?

In people with low blood levels of vitamin D, boosting them with supplements more than halved a person's risk of dying from any cause compared to someone who remained deficient, in a large new study.
Read article in The Vancouver Sun (Canada)

Note:Vitamin D3 is the best version of Vitamin D.

Vitamin D is crucial in human immune response to tuberculosis

Medical Xpress reports that Vitamin D is crucial in human immune response to tuberculosis. The researchers "found that T-cells, which are white blood cells that play a central role in immunity, release a protein called interferon-gamma that triggers communication between cells and directs the infected immune cells to attack the invading tuberculosis bacteria. However, this activation requires sufficient levels of vitamin D to be effective."

This important finding stirs very mixed emotions in me. In childhood and adolescence I suffered repeated bouts of pulmonary tuberculosis, after which time I was advised by health professionals to avoid exposing my skin to sunshine in case it reawakened the dormant TB germs. Vitamin D is known as the 'sunshine vitamin'. Clearly, in the light of this research finding (published online today,Oct. 12, in the peer-reviewed journal, Science Translational Medicine) the advice that I was given was completely wrong, and since I followed that advice for a long time, it cannot but have compromised my health. More and more, researchers are reporting the many health benefits that vitamin D bestows on us, and the many disbenefits that are caused by inadequate levels of vitamin D.

Vitamin D deficiency in cancer patients

More than three-quarters of cancer patients have insufficient levels of vitamin D (25-hydroxy-vitamin D) and the lowest levels are associated with more advanced cancer, according to a study presented on October 2, 2011, at the 53rd Annual Meeting of the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO).
Read article at medicalxpress.com

Taking prescribed oral steroids? You may have a severe deficiency of vitamin D.

People taking oral steroids are twice as likely as the general population to have severe vitamin D deficiency, according to a study of more than 31,000 children and adults by scientists at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University. Their findings, in the September 28 online edition of The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism, suggest that physicians should more diligently monitor vitamin D levels in patients being treated with oral steroids. Read this Medical Xpress report.

""When doctors write that prescription for steroids and they're sending the patients for lab tests, they should also get the vitamin D level measured," said study lead author Amy Skversky, M.D., M.S., assistant professor of pediatrics at Einstein and Montefiore Medical Center, the University Hospital for Einstein."

And remember, steroids include HRT and other oestrogen-containing drugs. And remember also that research in recent years has found that low vitamin D levels are very common indeed. And children are at even higher risk than adults are from adverse steroid side-effects.

Rickets reported in Cardiff

BBC Wales reports that cases of the crippling children's bone disease rickets are being seen in Cardiff. "Caused by a lack of vitamin D, the disease can lead to deformities like bowed legs and stunted growth, but it largely disappeared last century. Eye on Wales has learnt health professionals working in communities in south Cardiff are reporting incidents."

Vitamin D deficiency can result in a host of serious health conditions, including susceptibility to colds and flu, overweight and dental problems. See Vitamin D Deficiency. Sunshine is a good source of vitamin D. Food sources include oily fish such as salmon and sardines, eggs, full fat natural yoghurt, whole milk and beef liver. Low fat diets are not healthy, but they are particularly bad for children. Your doctor can arrange for vitamin D level testing.

Study finds gestational diabetes linked to vitamin D deficiency

Experts say all pregnant women should be tested for vitamin D deficiency after a new study found low levels are strongly linked to gestational diabetes. The study of 147 pregnant woman at Sydney's Westmead Hospital gestational diabetes clinic found 41 per cent were vitamin D deficient.
Read article in the Canberra Times (Australia)

Vitamin D deficiency now a worldwide problem

A study conducted by the Department of Health Sciences at Qatar University (QU) has shown that 53.5% of Qatari females of college age are severely vitamin D deficient and 43.6% have insufficient levels of the vitamin. Previous studies have shown that 68.8% of Qatari children aged 11-16 have insufficient levels of vitamin D, which can have an effect on skeletal and muscle development.
Read article in The Gulf Times (Qatar).

This is comment from the Dr Rath Foundation: Vitamin D deficiency is now a worldwide problem. In the United States, Canada, the UK and throughout the EU, for example, deficiencies of the vitamin are now widespread. Significantly, therefore, Anthony Norman, a distinguished professor emeritus of biochemistry and biomedical sciences and an international expert on vitamin D, notes that half the people in North America and Western Europe get insufficient amounts of vitamin D and that merely eating vitamin D-rich foods is not adequate to solve the problem. Elsewhere in the world, the problem is no less serious. Pregnant Arab women, for example, have an "extraordinarily high prevalence" of vitamin D deficiency, whilst India is also now home to a growing epidemic of vitamin D deficiency. Even Australia, a land with plentiful sunshine and an outdoor lifestyle, now has a “mind-boggling” rate of deficiencies in this nutrient.

Parents too readily give children paracetamol and ibuprofen for mild fever

Parents too readily give children paracetamol and ibuprofen for mild fever, the Telegraph reports. There are problems with dosage and over-dosage for children, and with combining the use of each of these drugs in turn, and with the very decision to try to lower the fever anyway, since fever is one of the ways in which the body seeks to fight infection.

Personally I deplore giving these painkiller drugs to children at all. Children should be protected from pharmaceutical drugs and their many potential and actual adverse side-effects. But parents are assailed by frequent advertisements for painkillers, and doctors' training is laced with over-reliance on the prescribing of drugs, i.e. the treatment of illness rather than the promotion and maintenance of health. Painkillers for children were unheard of when I was a child and we were all the better for not being given them. I'm sure we are all better off without most drugs and without their harmful side-effects.

Making sure we eat nutritious meals and get sufficient vitamins and minerals, especially vitamin D and calcium, the vitamin and mineral most often deficient or depleted in people's diets, is the best protection from infection, and prevention is always far better than cure.

Birmingham launches Vitamin D Against Rickets drive

Birmingham is launching a Vitamin D Against Rickets drive. Well done to Birmingham Community Healthcare NHS Trust, who have taken this important initiative to safeguard/improve the health of the children of Birmingham.

Rickets, in former times a disease of poverty and deprivation, has re-emerged in Birmingham and other parts of Britain, partly because of our chronic shortage of sunshine, partly because screening children from possible sunburn has been too zealous, and partly because the preponderance of processed foods and salty snacks makes modern-day children's meals less nutritious than they might be.

You've heard of rickety stairs, no doubt: rickety meaning shaky, not strong, weak, liable to break, etc. A child with rickets is recognisable by bowed legs as well as weakness and by the physical disabilities of this serious bone disease.

Safeguard your children's health by ensuring they get their share of sunshine when our summer eventually brings us some. And protect them from the harm that a salty food intake and ready meals with insufficient nutrition can do to them. Read Fat Retention and the consequences of salty food, insufficient calcium and insufficient Vitamin D. Read also about Salt Intake and Child Health. You can read further about Vitamin D and its many health benefits by clicking on the labels beneath this blogpost.

I've had my vitamin D level tested and have received the result

As some of my readers will know, I have been taking Vitamin D3 supplements since last Spring, and have greatly benefited from them: feeling stronger, finding it much easier to get up from a chair, steadier on my feet so less likely to fall, etc. - Well last Wednesday I had a dental appointment. This entailed climbing steps. - Suddenly I found this sooo much easier! I didn't need to hold onto the handrail. - My leg muscles managed on their own.

So the benefits of my vitamin D3 supplements are continuing to increase. And I've not had a cold or flu or any other respiratory infection since I started seriously supplementing with this vitamin. - It's my favourite vitamin now...(o: It has helped me so much.

I recently sent off for a home testing kit to get my vitamin D level measured and I received the results a week or two ago. I am informed that most experts consider the optimal level for health to be 50-70ng/nl, and mine was found to be 52ng/ml, so that's fine. - I reckon it shows clearly that I certainly needed the supplementation! I shall continue supplementing. I feel so much stronger.

There is a great deal of research these days that shows vitamin D deficiency to be common, especially in people who cannot get out into the sunshine in the summer to build up their stores of the sunshine vitamin. Maybe you too could benefit from taking vitamin D3 tablets. Especially if you are unsteady on your feet as I was, or have had a fracture from a fall, or find it difficult to rise from a chair or to climb stairs, or you repeatedly catch colds - maybe your doctor would consider it a good idea to arrange for you to have your vit D level checked and then take it from there. - It's worth checking, don't you think, for the sake of your health? There's more information about vitamin D on my Fat Retention webpage.

Indian study finds that most hip fracture patients are deficient in vitamin D

A study from New Delhi India has revealed high rates of vitamin D deficiency among hip fracture patients, confirming the conclusions of similar international studies which point to vitamin D deficiency as a risk factor for hip fracture.
Read article at physorg.com

Vitamin D is necessary for so many aspects of health and conversely there are a multitude of health problems that result from deficiency of vitamin D. - Worth making sure that you are not deficient in this vital vitamin, which is, unfortunately, the nutrient that research keeps finding most people in the developed world actually are short of.

Good News: 7 influential UK health groups are revising their position on Vitamin D

I recommend you to read the whole of this excellent article about the merits of Vitamin D, the sunshine vitamin, and about the harm done by not getting enough of this vital nutrient, often because of being wrongly advised by misinformed health experts. My personal experience is that by taking vitamin D3 supplements (my skin is too sensitive to sunshine for me to expose it to the sun much) my health has benefited immeasurably. I have not had a cold or cough or any other infection since I started taking the supplements, my muscle strength is much improved, my hair is in much better condition, etc.)

Survey about Vitamin D Deficiency

Many New Zealanders may be blocking out the health benefits of sunshine and becoming vitamin D deficient, researchers say. Growing evidence of vitamin D deficiency, including the re-emergence of childhood rickets, has prompted two health researchers to conduct an online survey of mothers and health professionals to find out how much they know about the essential vitamin. "There is emerging evidence that sections of the New Zealand population, ranging from newborn babies to the elderly, are vitamin D deficient," Massey University Vitamin D Research Centre co-director Pamela von Hurst said.
Read article in The New Zealand Herald
Comment: Vitamin D deficiency is becoming a worldwide problem. In the United States, Canada, the UK and throughout the EU, for example, deficiencies of the vitamin are now widespread. Anthony Norman, a professor emeritus of biochemistry and biomedical sciences and an international expert on vitamin D, notes that half the people in North America and Western Europe get insufficient amounts of vitamin D and that merely eating vitamin D-rich foods is not adequate to solve the problem.

Gabby Logan on Radio 5 - today' s vitamin supplements discussion

This programme missed the opportunity to do a great deal of good by giving information that is not widely known. Instead it rehearsed the usual distinctly disputable message that if you eat a good balanced diet you will get all the vitamins you need and the usual warning that if you take too high a dose you could harm yourself. The panel of speakers did correctly mention that certain groups, e.g. the housebound, need extra vitamin D, since food alone does not provide sufficient vitamin D. But I felt the tone of much that was said was on the lines of criticising people for eating poor diets and so it was their choice of poor diets that caused their nutritional deficiencies. We were also patronisingly told that staff in health stores will be trying to sell you supplements you may not need. I can't say that that has been my experience.

I did not hear anyone mention that prescription drugs often seriously deplete the body of nutrients. I wrote about this very recently: Medication often causes nutritional deficiencies. Dr Hilary Jones was one of Gabby's panel of speakers. I wonder whether he himself did not know much about this. Few doctors do. And few patients do. It would have been a good idea to have on the programme a doctor with a special interest and expertise in nutrition, e.g. Dr John Briffa.

Official leaflets for people of Scotland advising them to make sure they get enough Vitamin D - Well done, Ryan McLaughlin!

Schoolboy, Ryan McLaughlin, tirelessly campaigned on this issue and petitioned the Scottish Parliament to produce new guidelines on vitamin D supplements for children and pregnant women. His efforts have been successful. See BBC News report.

Because Scotland gets less sunshine than the more southerly regions of Britain, it is inevitably more difficult to get sufficient Vitamin D, the 'sunshine vitamin.' Inadequate levels of this vitamin result in many health problems, including more fragile bones, excess weight, muscle weakness and many more. (Click on the Vitamin D label just beneath this post if you would like more information about Vitamin D.) Possibly the most important of Vitamin D's contributions to health is protection from infections. - If you have enough Vitamin D you are far less likely to catch colds and flu, etc.

If getting out into the sun is a problem for you and you decide to take supplements of the sunshine vitamin, the best version is Vitamin D3. Vitamin D is also essential to metabolise calcium. Read about dairy calcium, fat retention and vitamin D on my webpage here.

Vitamin D deficiency is associated with risk of cognitive decline in the elderly

A research team from the Peninsula Medical School, University of Exeter, has established the first clear link between vitamin D deficiency and the development of cognitive problems that are a key feature of dementia. Findings from the study led by Dr. David J. Llewellyn are being published in the prestigious journal Archives of Internal Medicine, and are the result of an international collaboration involving researchers from the University of Michigan, the UK Medical Research Council Biostatistics Unit, the Perugia University Hospital and Medical School in Italy, and the US National Institute on Aging.
Read article at physorg.com

Most people do not get enough Vitamin D

Most people globally get insufficient Vit D
A health expert has said that more than half of the world’s population gets insufficient vitamin D.
Anthony Norman, a distinguished professor emeritus of biochemistry and biomedical sciences and an international expert on vitamin D, notes that half the people in North America and Western Europe get insufficient amounts of vitamin D. "Elsewhere, it is worse given that two-thirds of the people are vitamin D-insufficient or deficient. It is clear that merely eating vitamin D-rich foods is not adequate to solve the problem for most adults," said Norman.
Read article in The Times of India

Low vitamin D levels linked to metabolic syndrome in older people

Insufficient and deficient levels of vitamin D may increase the risk of metabolic syndrome by about 40 percent, according to new findings.
Read article at nutraingredients-usa.com

Pregnant women in the UK need to take supplements of vitamin D.

Despite some conflicting advice, researchers are recommending pregnant women to take vitamin D supplements because diet and sunshine are providing insufficient levels of the vitamin. Read the BBC News article. "The paper said the UK was the only one of 31 countries examined which did not recommend that women of reproductive age took a vitamin D supplement, and that it also fails to endorse a daily supplement for expectant mothers."

Avoiding vitamin D deficiency brings many health benefits, especially for pregnant mothers and the babies who will be born to them. - Check it out.