I've posted news about it before. It is so commonly associated with bolstering immune function, it almost became a familiar household term soon after we first heard about COVID. That immune-boosting substance is vitamin D.
But, do you really know enough about this “vitamin” to properly decide whether or not you really need it? How much should you take? Are there are other nutrients that are needed when you take vitamin D? What other effects does vitamin D have on your body when you take it? How much is too much? As well as, specifically, what might your current levels of vitamin D be?
These are important questions that you should have the answers to before pulling a vitamin D supplement off the shelf and consuming it. Let’s delve into these and other important details about vitamin D so that you can make an informed decision as to whether or not supplementation is right for you.
THE REASON FOR CONCERN
Statistically, nearly one in four individuals have vitamin D blood levels that are too low for bone and overall health according to the National Institutes of Health. It is also important to note that low vitamin D levels can create symptoms that are often mistaken for other health issues. Symptoms such as bone pain, fatigue, back pain, muscle weakness, or cramps can all be related to low levels of vitamin D. Mood changes and depression as well as weakness and a slower gait are symptoms of insufficient levels of vitamin D, which can trigger other health concerns related to falling as well.
Insufficient levels of vitamin D have also been associated with more serious health issues such as heart disease, breast and colon cancer, diabetes, and arthritis.
Cognitive issues such as confusion and disorientation can occur when vitamin D levels drop too low. If these signs and symptoms persist too long, they can lead to permanent memory loss. Insufficient vitamin D has also been linked to dementia symptoms and Alzheimer’s.
And yes, we now have proof from the University of Chicago that low vitamin D levels increase your risk of getting and dying from COVID-19 by up to 54%.
So, we know unequivocally that a lack of vitamin D causes a myriad of health concerns, some of which are truly life threatening. Now what do we do about it?
HOW VITAMIN D WORKS
It is important to understand what vitamin D actually is and how it works before we just go off taking unknown quantities of supplemental vitamin D.
I often have patients tell me that they work in the sun and therefore feel they have sufficient production of vitamin D naturally. Well, that may be the case. You see our bodies, amazing as they are, have the ability to produce vitamin D. This manufacturing process takes place at the level of the skin and requires two main raw materials. The first is cholesterol. Yes, cholesterol is not a terrible cardiac- and stroke-producing evil fat circulating in your body waiting to strike. No, in fact, just like everything else in this amazing ecosystem that we call our body, it too serves multiple purposes, and producing vitamin D is one of them. The other ingredient in this natural vitamin D synthesis is sun exposure. Unfortunately, however, multiple issues will interfere with this process. One comes if there are insufficient levels of the raw materials in the manufacturing process. If there is an insufficient level of cholesterol in the body or, like many today, poor sun exposure due to limited time spent outdoors.
However, for those who do feel that they have sufficient time outside, there is another part of the equation that must be factored in, and that is your age. You see, as you age your skin becomes thinner, and your natural production of vitamin D diminishes proportionally. By the time you are 70, your natural production of vitamin D is about half of what it was at age 20.
There are also a number of drugs that interfere with the natural production of vitamin D. They include laxatives, statin (cholesterol lowering drugs), steroids, and weight loss drugs.
Another issue is that once you are over 60, your body has more difficulty absorbing vitamin D from foods. So, even foods that are “enriched” with vitamin D may not be helping.
Obesity is also detrimental to the metabolism of vitamin D.
The amount of melanin in the skin also impedes the production of vitamin D. Therefore, the darker the skin the lower the production.
Why is vitamin D so important to our overall health and wellness you may ask? Consider the fact that it has an effect on over 2,000 different functions of the body. As noted earlier it affects the brain and nervous system as well as the bone structure of the body. Literally, vitamin D receptors are found on virtually every gland and organ in the body. It has a very strong effect on the body’s overall immune function.
SUPPLEMENTATION PROCESS
Just how do we know if we really need to supplement with vitamin D? The most reliable method is to know what your vitamin D level is currently. This is done through a simple blood test. Once that is known, a simple calculation can determine just how much vitamin D is needed to bring your level up to sufficiency.
But just how much vitamin D is enough in the body? Typically, your suggested normal lab values will be somewhere between 30 and 100 ng/dl. In the Functional Medicine world, it is suggested that the appropriate level is between 60 and 80 ng/dl.
I know that this has been a long article for many of you to stick with, but I have a critically important addition to the vitamin D story to expose you to right now. That is that if you are taking vitamin D without taking vitamin K, and specifically vitamin K2 with your vitamin D, you are missing a major synergist in your vitamin D health and wellness equation.
Vitamin K2 is an essential vitamin that controls the flow of calcium in the body. It also has many other beneficial qualities as well. The form of K2 that we use in the Center for Nutrition and Wellness has a half-life of 3 to 4 days in the body. In other forms, the half-life is less than 8 hours. (Half-life is the time required for a quantity to reduce to half of its initial value.)
Research studies have demonstrated that the combination of vitamin D and K2 is the method to support proper absorption of calcium into the bones. You see, when you consume vitamin D supplementation it will enhance the absorption of calcium from the gut. The big question then is where that calcium will be deposited once it is absorbed. As I have demonstrated to you today, proper supplementation of vitamin D is essential for overall health and wellness. But we need to understand the secondary effects of supplementation. One is the absorption of calcium. Now that we understand this fact, where that calcium is going in the body becomes critical to our health.
Consuming sufficient quantities of vitamin K2 will direct the calcium into the bones rather than into the soft tissues, thus, not into the arteries and veins as an example.
Once again, understand that certain drugs will interfere with your levels of vitamin K2, such as antibiotics, statins, and laxatives.
So, our takeaways from this information are:
- Vitamin D supplementation arguably is right for most of us, and particularly for those of us over age 60.
- Certain drugs will interfere with not only the absorption of vitamin D in the gut, but also the production of vitamin D.
- The raw materials for the production of vitamin D are sun exposure and cholesterol.
- We need to know what our vitamin D levels are before we begin supplementing so that we know how much to be taking.
- Natural production of vitamin D diminishes significantly as we age due to the thinning of the skin. This is particularly important for those who feel that they are getting sufficient production of vitamin D from their daily sun exposure.
- Vitamin K2 should be taken along with vitamin D to insure that calcium is being directed to the bones for absorption and not the soft tissues is another important point.
- Certain drugs interfere with vitamin K2 metabolism as well.
I hope that this information has been insightful and will assist you in your future quest on your health and wellness journey.