What Do You Lack? Probably Vitamin D
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
In my case the supplements have literally changed my life. I sleep better, I don't get mid-afternoon drowsiness any more (which I had for years), and my wife can predict whether I've been taking my supplements based on my mood.
EDIT: I should have mentioned that the blood test is extremely easy and inexpensive. Though try to avoid Quest Labs as there have been reports that their results are not accurate for Vitamin D. I have little doubt that my grad school years - in the office before 9am and out after 7pm - hurt my skin's ability to make Vitamin D. I started having afternoon drowsiness then and for over five years. Within one day of starting the supplements it has completely gone away.
How does that work?
If you are at all interested, a must read is The Vitamin D Solution.
Firstly, vitamin D deficiency is not the most common medical condition in the world. I don't know what the most common medical problem is, but of serious diseases Hepatitis B affects around 2 Billion people (http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0903696.html).
Secondly, even if you believe vitamin D deficiency is a serious problem then you may be surprised to learn about places such as China, India, Indonesia, Brazil, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria etc etc, all of which have very very large populations well south of the 33rd parallel. In fact, by far the majority of the worlds population lives south of the 33rd parallel north.
Thirdly, where I live (Australia) one of the major causes of death is cancer, specifically skin cancer. I know at least one person who sends her kids out to play in the sun in summer after hearing this (without sunscreen).
In my view Vitamin D deficiency is a minor problem, easily fixed which affects a small number of people. Blowing it up into a major issue has the potential to cause a much bigger problem (skin cancer) in a similar way to how vaccination scares caused public health risk.
Asked for a general recommendation, Dr. Holick suggests going outside in summer unprotected by sunscreen (except for the face, which should always be protected) wearing minimal clothing from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. two or three times a week for 5 to 10 minutes.
That's all it takes to fix the "problem"
I only got sunburnt once in Europe, and that was after being the sun all day with no sunscreen or hat. It took literally hours to get sunburnt. Here, I think 30 minutes is about all the average Australian can take, and for a recent arrival from Europe, 15 minutes will do them in, and 2 or 3 hours will put them in hospital.
My personal theory is that there is a lot more airborne pollution in Europe, and because of all the air traffic a lot of high-level cloud gets laid down by planes. You'll note the sky is never as deep blue as it is in Australia. I also think that because of the tilt in the Earth's axis, the SH summers receive a more directly overhead sun than even on the summer solstice in most of Europe. Finally my theory rounds out that, in Europe, periods of hot sunny weather seem to coincide with long periods of stable weather with little wind, when the pollution quicklyk builds. In Australia, in summer (in much of the country) the really hot days come during the thunderstorm period, when the high wind and heavy rain blows all the pollution away, and the next day is scorchingly hot.
Of course, all just random theories but based on a lot of observation.
Some people that thing they're getting sun while driving don't realize that auto windows are designed to block UV.
Even for developed countries, what about the side effects of overweight and obesity? According to the World Health Organization the 2 most common causes of death are heart attacks (ischemic, in particular with 12% of deaths) and brain circulatory diseases (e.g: stroke). Overweight/obesity is an important factor for both.
http://runningtimes.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=16940
Luckily the solution for most of us is to just go outside for 15 minutes and enjoy the sun!
Of course, the sun is also free (unless you worry that 15 mins/day can cause cancer) while if you buy supplements you'd want the high quality ones and preferably in a fatty medium for easier absorption. The D3 form is more easily converted by the body into an active form.
It's important to qualify that this is only true of people with lower levels of melanin (ie white people). For Hispanics and Asians/Indians the number is probably closer to 60 minutes, and for those of African descent the number is closer to 120 minutes.
You're missing out, really.
:)
http://www.google.com/search?q=%223-6+times%22+%22vitamin+d%...
My battery is about to die in the iPhone, so I don't have time to curate the list, but from a quick glance a couple of the sources from the google search look credible.
In the winter in the SF bay area, it's very unlikely your skin can make enough vitamin D.
After one winter here, I my D levels were at 20 ng/ml -- way below what many believe is the sufficient level of 30 ng/ml.
Assuming equal carcinogenic potential from sun exposure and from such beds (which is most likely an incorrect assumption), the results should be insightful.
The absolute amount of Vitamin D needed is quite modest, and the risk of cancer is (typically seen as) proportional to sun exposure; hence the recommendation for some - but not much - UV exposure.
The body was designed to get D from sun, and it is difficult to overdose that way unless you are a lifeguard. It is easy enough to overdose on D if it is taken orally.
There are other effects than vitamin D from sun exposure- it would be presumptuous to assume you could achieve optimal health from a vitamin D supplement.
In his book _The Vitamin D Solution_, Dr. Michael Holick ( the discoverer of the active form of Vit-D) debunks this myth with data. I haven't read most of it, but it looks interesting.
Excessive amounts of animal fat are bad since it is a saturated fat, but some is beneficial. I suspect that range fed beef has more vitamin D since animals in the open get more sun and would store vitamin D in a smaller amount of fat built up over more time.
Obese corn fed feed lot cattle are less healthy for other reasons also. The corn diet is very unnatural for them. It leads to rapid fat buildup with some meats containing over four times the fat of range fed animals. The diet causes the digestive system to become more acidic making the animals prone to various infections including E-coli a very dangerous bacteria. The E-coli mutates in the overly acidic animals becoming a form which humans often can't fight off without antibiotics if it wasn't already killed in cooking. The E-coli in range fed animals is not so troublesome. Bacterial that does survive in the animals loaded with antibiotics is also apt to be more resistant to treatment.
Because of the the danger of E-coli, ground beef must be cooked well done all the way through. Slaughter exposes meat from other parts of the animal to the bacteria and if gets mixed all the way through when ground. Other beef should be eaten fresh and washed well before cooking, and utensils and cutting boards used with the raw meat should be kept separate from those used for vegetables and other foods. Besides tasting better, non-ground beef is more nutritious if the color isn't cooked out. Meat that's still juicy contains a fair amount of iron in the blood.
PBS in the US has been running a documentary about corn production in Iowa. The subsidized inedible corn (tastes like cardboard, engineered for high yield per acre) is used mainly as cattle feed and to produce high fructose corn syrup, a non-nutritious addictive destructive AND CHEAP sweetener that's found its way into many of our foods. It's hurting us not only when consumed directly, but by degrading the beef produced as explained above. People consume more saturated fat in the beef. The excess fat and sugar has caused a major increase in diabetes in the last 20 years.
Although supplements help with vitamin D problems, we really should be looking closely at what we eat and how it is produced. END CORN SUBSIDIES!!! contact your representatives. The corn isn't profitable without subsidies, farmers (big business now) would switch to nutritious crops if not paid to do the wrong thing.
U.S. broadcasting has become dangerously consolidated in the hands of a small number of corporations and even more insidious venture capital groups. Pressure the F.C.C. and your representative for change, and watch and support your P.B.S. (non profit community tv) stations.
For all of us to be healthier we should step back and see what's going on, be educated, produce healthy foods, eat properly, and live a healthier lifestyle. Some would say that's all too costly, but disease treatment costs even more and there is no price tag on suffering.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/10/california-agr...
http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/getting-vitamin-d-...
My own report is that after taking 6000IU/day of vitamin D, I rarely suffer from afternoon drowsiness, whereas before it was so bad I'd sometimes go take a nap in in my car in 90+ degree heat around 3pm.
I used to have inadequate levels of Vitamin D at 13 ng/ML and jumped on 50,000 IU supplements for 8 weeks and now am on 5000 IU every 2nd day.
My Vitamin D levels are back into the healthy zone at 54 ng/ML and it has certainly made a massive difference in my well being and resistance to flu.
I obviously had to blog about it since it's such a cheap and simple fix to your health. Hence why pharmaceutical companies won’t talk about it.. http://blog.ernestsemerda.com/2010/02/09/we-are-starving-our...
Make sure you get the gelcaps if you get supplements. Blood tests have shown that dry tablets are really badly absorbed, so that some people who think they might be taking enough supplements could still be deficient.
http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/
Check the archives for more.
http://healthnow.blogspot.com/2005/01/tons-of-vitamins-remov...
Dr. Holick suggests going outside in summer unprotected by sunscreen (except for the face, which should always be protected) wearing minimal clothing ... two or three times a week for 5 to 10 minutes
I'm pretty confident that I'm not going to suffer from Vitamin D deficiency. (Skin cancer maybe...)
Seriously, I can't think of any of my friends who regularly spend time outside with their shirt off each week, which I'm pretty sure is what is meant by "minimal clothing."
If it were that easy I don't think deficiency would be so prevalent. I agree that it's almost impossible not to get 30 min of partial exposure.
It's like UV has some sort of x-ray goggle-like ability...
So I'm pretty sure I'm not Vitamin D deficient.
"There has been some concern that use of sun protection factor (SPF) of 15 results in vitamin D deficiency. However, a randomized trial in people over 40 years of age found that sunscreen use over the summer had no effect on 25-hydroxyvitamin D3 levels."
Source: http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/3rduspstf/skcacoun/skcarr.htm
1. Reduced gut uptake of (fat-soluble) Vitamin D due to malabsorption.
2. Reduced renal hydroxylation of 25-hydroxyvitamin D3 into 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D3.
I can't speak to your daughter's specific problems, but since she has gut and, possibly, renal disease (given her diabetes), Vitamin D deficiency is quite possibly a consequence of those problems, and almost certainly not cause.
The rising incidence of Type 1 diabetes may be due, in part, to the current practice of protecting the young from sun exposure. When newborn infants in Finland were given 2,000 international units a day, Type 1 diabetes fell by 88 percent, Dr. Holick said.
So I suspect that your statement, "vitamin D deficiency is ... of those problems [including type-1 diabetes mellitus] ... almost certainly not cause," is undermined by the evidence. Do you know of some problem with the study cited in the article?
I'm still a bit skeptical, because the human genetic data, so far, doesn't back up the association between Vit D deficiency genes and T1D. Nevertheless, I'll revise my statement to agree that both (a) diabetes can cause a decrease in the hormonally active form of vitamin D, and (b) high-quality Grade B evidence suggests that the converse is also true.
Nevertheless, I don't see Vitamin D deficiency as the unifying diagnosis here. One could even speculate that the Vit D deficiency was secondary, and the T1D was tertiary, but we really don't have enough information to speculate here and I'll stop now. I probably shouldn't have in the first place.
If there were an association between T1D and Vit D, you would expect an excess of Vit-D-associated variants among those with T1D when compared to matched individuals. It is true that if 75% of the population is Vit D deficient and most of this is due to environmental effects, this would would hurt your power, requiring a larger study before convincing yourself that the null hypothesis really should not be rejected. Hence the couching of my language with "so far," since I know that associations can definitely be uncovered as sample size increases. But given the high heritability, at least in some populations, we shouldn't need a stratospheric sample size to detect association.
I hadn't seen a GWAS on Vitamin D levels before you asked your question, but I pubmedded it and it turns out that a small one came out this month: http://hmg.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/19/13/2739?vi...
In short, 4 base pairs (out of 3 billion) account for 2.8% of the population variance of circulating Vitamin D. With such a small # of people, it's not surprising that few independent SNPs hit the genome-wide significance level, but it's still pretty impressive that the 4 SNPs that they found can account for so much of the variance. (In other words, it looks like they identified the source of ~5% of the genetic variance, or 2.8% of the total variance.)
This looks much like the lipids story: early GWASs give you a handful of loci with influence, and later GWASs with may more participants will give you a much richer set of loci that collectively explain 20-30% of the variance. And keep in mind that these are just the common SNPs.
The complications of chronic hyperglycaemia take years to develop, and T1D develops fast. There's no way a newly diagnosed T1D would have renal complications at the time of diagnosis, never mind a year earlier.
Asked for a general recommendation, Dr. Holick suggests going outside in summer unprotected by sunscreen (except for the face, which should always be protected) wearing minimal clothing from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. two or three times a week for 5 to 10 minutes.
Slathering skin with sunscreen with an SPF of 30 will reduce exposure to ultraviolet-B rays by 95 to 98 percent. But if you make enough vitamin D in your skin in summer, it can meet the body’s needs for the rest of the year, Dr. Holick said.
Personally I'd rather take a supplement than risk skin cancer later in life from sun exposure. There is definitely a tradeoff between the natural technique of acquiring vitamin D and the safe way. Getting vitamin D via sunlight on the skin was safer when we had more ozone and fewer ultraviolet rays.
Skin cancer is as much a pre-disposition affair as it is induced by UV radiation, and people with far higher exposure levels are still not at a significant risk for skin cancer unless their genetic make-up is such that they are very prone to contracting it.
If you have extremely light skin, have freckles (especially darker ones), have red hair or if there is a history of skin cancer in your family better be careful though.
Otherwise, enjoy the sun but don't overdo it.
That article of others noted that the normal range for vitamin D tests is too low. Someone who is low normal is probably deficient. Vitamin D is not just for rickets. A deficiency can cause all kinds of other nonspecific problems.
TWiT link: http://www.twit.tv/sn209
Transcript: http://www.grc.com/sn/sn-209.htm
Steve Gibson's dedicated Vitamin D page: http://www.grc.com/health/vitamin-d.htm
So I'm left wondering, did I not need it, or am I not taking enough.
So as for everything else, the dose makes the poison, but typical official recommendations (1000IU/day and lower) seem to be a fraction of what's best and a tiny fraction of what's safe.
Still, if you haven't been tested, you should. It's easy and inexpensive.
Interestingly, a strong immune system is not always good. I am allergic to everything. (But that problem is solved with immunotherapy.)
Note that regular unrefined cod liver oil is very high in vitamin A, so you can kill yourself by drinking enough of it(see hypervitaminosis A). Vitamin A pills contain trivial amounts though(to stop people from killing themselves I am told), so the cod liver oil is a nice way to go if you feel that you need to supplement for some reason. And of course you also get the D, some nice fatty acids, and maybe a little mercury too.
Data: http://www.fda.gov/food/foodsafety/product-specificinformati...
I began raising my own pigs last year, and one of the things I get back from the slaughter house is about 20 pounds per pig of fatback and leaf lard.
Do you know what the USDA has to say about the vitamin D content of pork lard? 2,800 IU per 100g.
So, it seems as though our consumption of animal fat in the winter time helps to offset the fact that the sun in the great white north is so rare. It would also help explain why Inuit and other far northern cultures don't die of vitamin difficencies. (i.e., our bodies are extraordinary machines and have developed ways to function optimally without relying on a single source of any one nutrient) It is only when we shuffle the deck and start eating a tropical, fruit + veggie heavy diet, in January that all hell breaks loose.
Of course, from everything I've read, it would also appear that pure corn-fed lard is so bad for you that the vitamin D doesn't matter. Best to eat pastured organic pork lard (oh, and plenty of fatty fish) in the winter time or move back to the equator.
Also, I should hope that the farmer is using some form of dewormer. There are plenty of proven organic herbal supplements you can give livestock that drastically reduce the parasite load of your average farm animal. I'm using a two-step wormwood-based dewormer and also supplement my animals' diets with garlic powder.
Sweet, garlic flavored pork!
Not true. It is unfortunate that myths like this get spread. Trichinosis is virtually non-existent in the pig populations. If you want trichinosis then I would recommend eating wild bear from down south. If you want to avoid it, just cook your meat. In either case, better not to spread lies from Big Ag.
Do you read Walter Jeffries blog on Sugar Mountain Farm? http://flashweb.com He has a lot to say about how he raises his pigs on pasture using free surplus whey & milk from local dairies, etc. I've learned a lot from him about raising chickens & pigs.
Pigs are also nature's rototillers. Instead of a cover crop, my wife and I put the pigs on the garden and let them go to town. They turn over EVERY corner, pooping as they go. By next May, we're all good to plant again!
We've also got meat birds, which I can say I've never had better meat that what we've raised the past few years. Also can't beat that we slaughter them ourselves. From chick to oven without ever leaving the farm, perfect!
Vitamin D comes in many forms -- and not all are equal: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cholecalciferol
Also, D2 causes overdose effects pretty easily, but you can take big multiples of the "RDA" in D3 (I think 10,000 IU/day for months for vitamin D deficiency has been mentioned) for quite a while without overdosing.
That's actually a problem, as people can become accustomed to taking large doses and then not understand why problems are occurring when they start way down the road.