Higher- than-recommended doses of Vitamin D reduced risk of atrial fibrillation | Hacker News Reader

Higher- than-recommended doses of Vitamin D reduced risk of atrial fibrillation

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108 pointsCharlesW29 comments

This is one of those terrible studies that looks at every disease under the sun and inevitably something comes back with a positive association (even though it's probably just statistical noise) and they publish that single result. Take it with a huge grain of salt.

Looking at their other study using this same data, they found an INCREASE in major cardiovascular events among people with lower-than-average BMI with Vit D supplementation which was statistically significant: https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/115/5/1300/6496028

In other words: if an HN reader clicks on this thread and has the question "should I take Vitamin D?", the answer is: no one knows, and this study likely can't inform your decision.

You write like they have some agenda to promote vitamin D3.

Instead, they publish both negative and positive results related to things they were interested in from the start. They find how things are.

The Finnish Vitamin D Trial (FIND) is very large randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, 5-year supplementation study of the benefits and risks of vitamin D in the primary prevention of cardiovascular (CVD) and cancer among 18000 men 60 years or older and women 65 years or older. https://classic.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01463813

They don't find how things "are", they do the typical useless epidemiological study which I described and find spurious connections in statistical noise. This is why nutrition epidemiology is largely a failed science - it can't actually tell us anything useful: https://metarationality.com/nutrition

It seems to me that you just commented on the title.

If you actually read the study, you find out they did not find strong connection.

It’s not a failed science. It tells us useful things all the time including countless things that you take for granted. Pointing out industry interests and better evidence superseding worse evidence doesn't change that.

In my experience, harping on epidemiology always seems to boil down to inconsistent epistemological standards that favor the foods someone wants to eat.

Most commonly, epidemiology is shit because it gives us strong causal inferences for trans and saturated fats being bad for us BUT we want to eat meat and dairy so nvm epi studies suck except for the ones I take for granted.

> This is why nutrition epidemiology is largely a failed science - it can't actually tell us anything useful

Hmmm.... I haven't suffered from scurvy, pellagra, rickets, or beriberi lately. You're saying that's just a coincidence?

As someone with the same general opinion, how do you know what kind of food/diet/vitamins are right for you?

Self experimentation, but default to "Lindy" nutrition. Look at things that have stood the test of time and allowed humans to flourish rather than die off. Focus on traditional diets, fast (don't eat 3 meals with snacks between - humans did not evolve to have that kind of caloric input, look at the obesity epidemic).

Green jellybeans and all that: https://xkcd.com/882/

If you don't prepublish what you are specifically looking for, you can eventually find something that will match.

They definitely have an incentive to publish results people will care about, as any other researcher that is part of an academic environment.

Researchers in the field care about results that show what is the real effect of D3 vitamin could be, and that's what these guys are doing.

Small, but not very big effect.

Which is the problem with the medical research.

They are figuring out if it is better to cut your toenails 2 times a week or 3 times a week, while obesity is killing millions.

In most countries, the officially suggested intake of Vitamin D per day is 800 IU.

There is a study that showed that running around naked in the sun for 30 minutes is equivalent to taking 15000 IU:

https://ar.iiarjournals.org/content/29/9/3495.long

Considering that our ancestors were doing that for more than 30 minutes per day, I wouldn't be surprised if the suggested amount of Vitamin D intake will increase in the coming years.

The current, very low RDA of 400-800 IU is based on a statistical error in the analysis done by the Institute of Medicine back in the 1960s; see "The Big Vitamin D Mistake" [1].

Finnish researchers have determined that the previously recommended serum concentration of 50 nmol/L should probably be adjusted much higher, probably closer to 100 nmol/L, at the very least to 70 nmol/L. For adults, especially those living in the higher latitudes, that requires around 8,000-10,000 IU per day.

Nobody has done more research on vitamin D than the Finns. Back when the low RDA was adopted (pretty much worldwide), Finland saw an increasing rate of rickets and type 1 diabetes. After they started fortifying milk with vitamin D in the early 2000s, rates have fallen significantly.

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5541280/

Step 1. VD3 blood test is a must to determine whether one is deficient. If you work indoors all day there is a high chance you are deficient. Your GP can help you boost it up using 70K IU prescription VD3.

Step 2. Then maintenance. This is all a trial and error and more blood tests. 800 IU / the national recommendation is a joke. Dr. Fauci takes 6,000 IU each day. (see FOIA docs with his email saying what he takes).

I work in tech and take 10 IU each day and have maintained a ~ 60 ng/mL.

Anything over 50 ng/mL shows benefits in fighting respiratory viruses and keeping mortality close to zero. ref: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34684596/#&gid=article-figur...

The catch is that your body wont overproduce if you already have sufficient levels. Supplementing when you don't need it is a bad idea.

Is the difference not, that when your body generates it in the sun it'll stop when its got enough. where as when you ingest it you're force feeding yourself the vitamin..?

>In most countries

You claim this based on what data?

It's the same 20-25ug daily for adults in all the major western sources: EFSA, NIH, NHS, Mayo, Harvard. Yes, there are recent studies (2020s) suggesting it should be higher and likely the RDA will rise, but you should really be taking vit K with it for proper utilization.

https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/vitamin-d/

It's 5 and 10 in AUS/NZ, 15 in Canada, 10 in the UK, 15 in the EU, 10 in Sweden, 20 in France, etc. for normal adults

Will results from Finland, which sits at a rather extreme latitude, generalize to the rest of the world?

They should generalize to people who stay most of the time indoors, regardless of latitude.

It occurs to me that I'm probably not getting enough vitamin D.

First off I work indoors and it rains a lot here, so there's not a lot of outside time.

And even when it is sunny and I get out - I live below the hole in the ozone layer and I'm fair skinned. Meaning I cover up a lot to avoid skin cancer.

Think I'll get this checked out.

Definitely worth checking out. I went from 20ng/ml to 50ng/ml within a year and noticed some mood stability and energy increases. Your mileage may vary.

For what it is worth, I live in Texas and get plenty of sun each day(30+ minutes) but for some reason not enough showing on blood work.

It’s possible you’re not getting enough precursors to allow for sunlight to greatly increase vitamin D production. How much fat do you eat in a day? Skin tone is an additional factor as well.

Also, an aside, it’s humorous to me that you describe 30+ minutes a day as “plenty of sun”. By todays standards, definitely. But the natural state of humankind is “however many minutes there is sun” worth of sun per day.

Caves and trees and other natural shelter were presumably available and used by the 'natural' humans, and clothing/constructed shelter was a thing after not too long as well. So it's not like we were in the sun literally all day bud.

Possible to get hypercalcemia from too much and hypercalcemia is not fun at all, speaking from experience.

Hypercalcemia is extremely rare, and is linked to hyperparathyroidism. The association between hypercalcemia and vitamin D is vastly overstated.

Our ancestors in Africa got hours of sun exposure, and synthesized tens of thousands of IUs daily. How they managed to survive to reproductive age without getting hypercalcemia is a miracle! In fact, the very existence of our species proves that God exists. Given the dangers of hypercalcemia, that has to be the only explanation.

Same

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