Advice Column on
Vitamin D
By: Scott Hensley
I'm sure you have heard of vitamin D. Scientists were trying to
find a cure for rickets, a painful childhood done disease. In the meantime,
while searching, scientists discovered vitamin D. Before too long foods were filled
with vitamin D, and rickets became rare in the United States. This was only the
beginning of the research into vitamin D. Research shows that vitamin D may
have an important role in many ways for human health.
Vitamin D is one of the 13 vitamins found in the early 20th century by doctors
studying nutritional deficiency diseases. Ever since, scientists have defined
vitamins as organic chemicals that have to be obtained from a person’s diet
because they are not produced in the human body's tissue. Vitamins play an important
part in our body's metabolism, but only small amounts are needed to fill that
role.
Although vitamin D is known as one of the four fat-soluble vitamins, it's not
technically a vitamin. Yes, it’s essential for health, but only small amounts
are needed. It breaks other rules because vitamin D it produced in the human
body, it's absent from all natural foods except fish and egg yolks. Even when
vitamin D is obtained from foods, it must be transformed by the body before it
can have any effect.
As our habits change, most of us can't rely on our bodies to produce enough
vitamin D. We are starting to depend on artificially fortified foods and pills
to provide it for us. In the modern world, this substance may actually become
known as a vitamin under technical terms.
Our bodies make
this vitamin by the sunlight. The suns energy turns a chemical in our skin into
vitamin D3. It then is carried to your liver and then your kidneys to transform
into active vitamin D. This vitamin is best known to keep bones healthy by
increasing the intestinal adsorption of calcium. Without vitamin D, the body
can't absorb enough calcium that is needed. This can lead to rickets in
children and osteomalacia in adults. It’s also makes the bones more brittle
which can lead to fracture.
Vitamin D plays an important role in regulating cell growth. Lab experiments
suggests that it helps prevent the unrestrained cell multiplication that characterizes
cancer by reducing cell division, restricting tumor blood supple increasing
death of cancer cells, and limiting the spread of cancer cells.
The recommended dose for vitamin D has changed over the years. Until 1997,
dietary allowance for vitamin D was 200 IU for all adult. Now, facing growing
evidence of vitamin D deficiencies in Americans, the recommended dose for 51 to
70-year-olds was increased to 400 IU, and 600 IU to people over the age of 70.
Is more better? Research says yes it is, and many more authorities are
recommending 800 or even 1,000 IU a day. That's a lot of vitamin D. Just
remember though, you can take too much. Too much vitamin D can reach to toxic
levels. This can raise blood calcium to levels that can cause grogginess,
constipation, and even death. Just be careful.
As you can see this vitamin is crucial to human health.
You’re advised to further educate yourself about vitamin D and better yourself
by taking it and becoming a better you.
Works
Cited
"New
Releases." Vitamin D and
Your Health. Harvard Health Publications, Feb. 2007. Web. 24
Apr. 2014.
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