What is vitamin D?



         What is Vitamin D



         Sun Shine vitamin  

We always talk about vitamin D .Do you know what it is   and how can we improve our body with this vital vitamin?

First of all do you know from where we can get this vitamin?

Vitamin D is a naturally present in a very few foods, added to others, and available as a dietary supplements. It is also produced when the UV rays from the sun strike to our skin.

Vitamin D long known to improve our bone and muscle health .I t promotes calcium absorption from our food and maintains adequate serum calcium and phosphate concentrations to enable normal mineralization of bone .It is also needed for bone growth and bone remodeling. Without sufficient vitamin D, bones can become thin, brittle. Vitamin D sufficiency prevents rickets in children and osteomalacia in adults. Together with calcium, vitamin D also helps protect older adults from osteoporosis. Vitamin D has other roles in our body, including cell growth, neuromuscular and immune function, and reduction of inflammation.



What is deficiency?

The meaning of deficiency in literacy means lack of an adequate quantity or number. In medical term nutrient deficiencies are usually the result of dietary inadequacy impaired absorption and use, increased requirement, or increased excretion. A vitamin D deficiency can occur when usual intake is lower than recommended levels over time, exposure to sunlight is limited, and the kidneys cannot convert the inactive vitamin D to its active form, or absorption vitamin D from the digestive tract is inadequate. Vitamin D deficiency is known to affect more than 80% of the population in the United States alone, and up to a billion people worldwide, have insufficient levels of vitamin D.

What are the serious causes of vitamin D deficiency?

Vitamin D deficiency is known to cause several bone diseases. The deficiency results in impaired bone mineralization, and leads to bone softening diseases including:

Rickets: is a childhood disease characterized by stumped growth, and deformed long bones like the legs and arms. These bone condition caused by calcium and vitamin D deficiency in early childhood can have very effects on the development of the bones.

Rickets in children

Osteomalacia:  bone-thinning disorder that occurs
exclusively in adults and is characterized by proximal muscle weakness and bone fragility. The major cause for Osteomalacia is insufficient or faulty metabolism of vitamin D or calcium (calcium deficiency).

Osteoporosis: a condition characterized by reduced bone mineral density and increased bone fragility. Bones affected by Osteoporosis are more at risk of fracture. Osteoporotic fractures in healthy people under slight amount of stress. They would not normally lead to fractures in healthy people not affected Osteoporosis. Typical fractures occur in the vertebral column, hip and wrist.




Osteoporosis in adults

Now we know about the deficiency of vitamin D, so what are the symptoms of that deficiency?

A question that will be asked frequently is “What are the symptoms of vitamin D deficiency?” There are many possible effects of low vitamin D levels, below are the most important vitamin D deficiency symptoms in men and women:

As we know vitamin D has these hormonal functions: regulation of overall bone health, regulation of overall muscle health(this includes both skeletal and also the heart muscle), regulation of the so important immune response, regulation of the levels of insulin and of blood sugar, and regulation of levels for calcium and for phosphorus metabolism.

Even through research is ongoing, there are strong indications that vitamin D plays an important role in prevention of the following types of cancer: bladder cancer, breast cancer, colon cancer, ovarian cancer, and prostate and rectal cancer. Two cancers of these cancer types are widespread among women, and supplementing with vitamin D or making sure the body has a chance to produce enough vitamin D may help prevent cancer in women. Some of the symptoms can be a lack of energy, skin and hair that look tired and lack tone and brilliance. It’s not only a deficiency in vitamin D, but general lack of vitamins that can affect your body and mind and your performance.

Vitamin D requirements increases with age, while the ability of the skin to convert the inactive form of vitamin D to its active form decreases. In addition also the ability of the kidneys to convert the inactive vitamin D to active vitamin D also decreases with age, promoting the need for increased vitamin D supplementation in elderly persons.

What is the effect of vitamin D



Did you ever hear about a person had a Vitamin D
overdose?

Vitamin D overdose-can a person take too much?

As with everything possible to be overdose, but with vitamin D we can’t get too much vitamin from exposure to sunlight or from normal food intake.

For the overdose of vitamin D, it will not happen in a single intake of a large dose of the vitamin supplement.

If a hypervitaminosis D occurs, it’s usually due to large doses of the vitamin supplements over an extended period of time.

Here are a few symptoms that might occur, these are some of the health risks of excessive intake of vitamin D:

-The elevated levels of calcium in the blood, resulting from an increase in the absorption of calcium in the intestinal tract.

-Abnormally large deposition of amounts of phosphate and calcium in soft tissue such as the lungs, heart and kidneys. These deposits can cause irreversible organ malfunction.

-Nausea, vomiting, poor appetite and loss of weight

-High blood pressure, heart rhythm irregularities risk of heart disease

-Kidney stones and renal failure

-Excessive production of urine

-An overdose of vitamin D in pregnant women can cause mental retardation in babies

Other symptoms can occur when a hypervitaminosis D is present:

-Bone pain and even bone loss

-Muscular weakness and fatigue

-Nervousness and irritability

-Excessive thirst, dehydration

-Severe headache

-Deafness

-Itchy skin

Now we will know what are the good sources of vitamin D?

In some countries, milk and cereal grains are fortified with vitamin D, so always check the nutrition labeling of food for vitamin D.

Natural sources of vitamin D

What are the natural sources of vitamin D?

Fatty fish such as:

-Catfish 85g provides 425 IU

-Salmon, cooked 100g provides 360 IU

-Mackerel, cooked 100g provides 345 IU

-Sardines, canned in oil and drained 50g provides 250 IU

-Tuna, canned in oil 100g provides 235 IU

-Eel, cooked 100g provide 200 IU

-Fish liver oil, such as Cod liver oil 1 tablet provides 1360 IU

The other natural sources are:

-A whole egg provides 20 IU

-Beef liver, cooked 100g provides 15 IU*

(* IU means international unit used for weighing)

-UV-irradiated mushroom and UV-irradiated yeast are the only vegan sources of vitamin D from the stuff. Both yeast and mushroom materials, when irradiated with UV, produce vitamin D.

What are the desirable levels of vitamin D for us?

-If the level of vitamin D lower than (25 nmol/L).

 This will be associated with the most severe deficiency disease (rickets in infants and children, and osteomalacia in adults)

-A level of vitamin D between (20 to 50 nmol/L). This will be considered as insufficient needs improvements.

-If the level of vitamin D above (75 nmol/L). This will be achieving optimum health.

-But if the level of vitamin D reached above (500 nmol/L). This will be potentially toxic, and the toxicity usually results from taking supplements in excess.

Finally as a laboratory, how can we help you?

We as a laboratory we can offer you the latest technology to do the tests for vitamin Dand other medical tests. Hopefully I explained well the information of vitamin D and will help you to understand it very well.

How can we help

Sources:

-An article of (The discovery dates of the vitamins and their sources)

-An article of (NIH office Dietary supplements- Dietary supplement fact sheet- Vitamin D)

-An article of (Vitamin D deficiency symptoms-causes and treatments)