Vitamin D changes everything

tech/a said:

"Dealing with Alzheimer's"
By
Dr Who?

Sorry Julia had to do it!

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Tech-A, given my absent mindedness, you might be closer to the truth than you think!

tech/a said:

I tend to agree Broadway.
There was a time when I was firmly a believer of "Natural therapies"
While I still believe an holistic approach is best and all in moderation,I am now firmly in Julia and Your court.

A very good friend of mine owned a health food store.
At 50 she was amazing--looked late 30s.
Was a feak with health from juicing to exercise to avoiding pesticides---you name it!
At 53 diagnosed with breast cancer and needed a small lump of around the size of a thumb nail removed.
She declared that she would beat the cancer naturally.
My exact words to her were that she was gambling a very high price--her life.
2 yrs later she died. Would still be alive today had she had the initial lump removed.

Of the 8 people I know who have been diagnosed with terminal cancer only one is surviving and he did not go down the "natural' therapies road.
All the others did.

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This reminds me of someone who was diagnosed with one of the leukaemias. The oncologist told him if he didn't have aggressive treatment his outlook was dismal.

So he reluctantly agreed, having been firmly told that his preference for the 'natural approach' was a waste of time.

During the several weeks of the treatment he also pretty much fasted, ate nothing cooked, lots of raw juice etc.

Eventually he was pronounced cured, but seemed to think it was largely his 'natural' cure and his positive attitude that had been more influential in his recovery than the medical care.

Certainly mistakes are made in conventional medicine, but I've just never understood the unswerving belief that some people have that anything that is taken via a doctor's prescription is less 'healthy/beneficial' than something they buy in a health food store. Do they just not know that most of these substances are not tested for efficacy?

Agree absolutely with Broadway that the vitamin and general health food industry has done a massively successful sales job.

Went for a swim today, got a substantial dose of vitamin D.
Especially by the looks of my tan.

Tech-A, given my absent mindedness, you might be closer to the truth than you think!

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Nah your pretty sharp!

Is there a Merc in the garage for Xmas??
And a pair of goggles for Rover?

I have a paramedical background and am skeptical of the 'complimentary medicine industry' to a large degree. It used to be called alternative, but could not demonstrate that it was an alternative in randomised double blind trials. However I am a bit of a believer in VitaminD, but I dont need to buy it in Australia. One of the constant 'funny' themes of South Park and The Simpsons is the way the adults over react. We have over reacted to sun damage to a point where people don't get any exposure. VitaminD is on the discharge regime for the elderly in NSW as prophylaxis against osteoporosis, my brother in law is visiting a dermatologist for UVB treatment for psoriasis. There is increasing literature coming out in support of Vitamin D but I'll try and get mine from the sun, not a bottle.
A good little read rubbishing the complementary / alternative health industry is called "Snake oil and Other Remedies" written by an English journo(smoker), dying of throat cancer. Cant recall his name.
Good health to all on the forum in 2011, I'd hope and pray

Some Important Problems in the last post imo ( hence the post )

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed


How to optimize vitamin D supplementation to prevent cancer

The question of what makes an 'optimal' vitamin D intake is usually equivalent to, 'what serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] do we need to stay above to minimize risk of disease?'. This is a simplistic question that ignores the evidence that fluctuating concentrations of 25(OH)D may in themselves be a problem, even if concentrations do exceed a minimum desirable level.

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I propose that delay in cellular adaptation, or lag time, in response to fluctuating 25(OH)D concentrations can explain why higher 25(OH)D in regions at high latitude or with low environmental ultraviolet light can be associated with the greater risks reported for prostate and pancreatic cancers.

At temperate latitudes, higher summertime 25(OH)D levels are followed by sharper declines in 25(OH)D, causing inappropriately low 1-hydroxylase and high 24-hydroxylase, resulting in tissue 1,25(OH)2D below its ideal set-point.

This hypothesis can answer concerns raised by the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer about vitamin D and cancer risk. It also explains why higher 25(OH)D concentrations are not good if they fluctuate, and that desirable 25(OH)D concentrations are ones that are both high and stable.

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eg

Global breast cancer seasonality.
Oh EY, Ansell C, Nawaz H, Yang CH, Wood PA, Hrushesky WJ.
Medical Chronobiological Laboratory, Dorn Research Institute, WJB Dorn VA Medical Center, School of Medicine and School of Public Health, University of South Carolina, 6439 Garners Ferry Road, Columbia, SC 29209, USA.


Abstract
Human breast cancer incidence has seasonal patterns that seem to vary among global populations. The aggregate monthly frequency of breast cancer diagnosis was collected and examined for 2,921,714 breast cancer cases diagnosed across 64 global regions over spans from 2 to 53 years. Breast cancer is consistently diagnosed more often in spring and fall, both in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, regardless of presumable menopausal status (<or=50, >50). This seasonality is increasingly more prominent as population distance from the equator increases and this latitude dependence is most pronounced among women living in rural areas.

Moreover, the overall annual incidence (2005-2006), per 100,000 population, of breast cancer increased as the latitude of population residence increased. These data make it clear that human breast cancer discovery occurs non-randomly throughout each year with peaks near both equinoxes and valleys near both solstices. This stable global breast cancer seasonality has implications for better prevention, more accurate screening, earlier diagnosis, and more effective treatment.

This complex latitude-dependent breast cancer seasonality is clearly related to predictable local day/night length changes which occur seasonally. Its mechanism may depend upon seasonal sunlight mediation of vitamin D and seasonal mediation of nocturnal melatonin peak level and duration.

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And Particular Nasty

"Triple-negative breast cancer is the most aggressive and hardest to treat form of the disease, as it is unresponsive to all the most effective drugs. The researchers found that it was eight times more common in women with vitamin D deficiency than in those with adequate levels of the vitamin."


And another

Cases J. 2009 Jul 21;2:8390.
Triple negative breast cancer patients presenting with low serum vitamin D levels: a case series.
Rainville C, Khan Y, Tisman G.
A Medical Corporation 13025 Bailey Street, Suite A, Whittier, CA 90601 USA.
Abstract
INTRODUCTION: Serum vitamin D levels measured as 25-hydroxyvitamin D have been shown to be low in cancer patients, including breast cancer patients. However, the vitamin D status has yet to be studied in different breast cancer phenotypes: luminal A, luminal B, HER2+/ER-, and triple negative comprising the majority of basal-like.
CASE PRESENTATION: Fifteen triple-negative breast cancer patients have presented to our medical oncology office in the last five years.

Thirteen of these fifteen patients (87%) were found to be vitamin D deficient, defined as serum 25(OH)D less than 80 nmol/L, prior to initiation of adjuvant therapy. Ninety-one breast cancer patients from our office were classified as: luminal A (ER+ &/or PR+ and HER2-), luminal B (ER+ &/or PR+ and HER2+), HER2+/ER- (ER-, PR-, and HER2+), and triple-negative or basal-like (ER-, PR-, and HER2-). A normal mean was found from 78 volunteers. The breast cancer patients were found to be statistically different than the normal population. The triple-negative phenotype was found to be the most statistically different than the normal population.

CONCLUSION: The triple-negative breast cancer phenotype has the lowest average vitamin D level and the highest percentage of patients that are vitamin D deficient. These data suggests that low vitamin D levels are characteristic of the triple-negative phenotype.

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Optimal is not what you have heard that is just necessary for bones..
That is just 15% if "all the other tanks are full "..


AND Optimal is not just higher levels BUT ALSO STABLE .


Also Skin as it ages gets thiner and significantly loses the ability to make Vitamin D... Which is what will protect you from the SUN as well

Vitamin D is not the same as any other Vitamin or Nutrient
None of them are derived from Sunlight

And the earlier posted pivotal Studies
are NOT funded by "DRUG COMPANIES" or Vitamin PILL MERCHANTS

As well as being a well-known risk factor for rickets, there is a growing body of evidence that vitamin D deficiency also increases an individual's susceptibility to autoimmune conditions such as multiple sclerosis (MS), rheumatoid arthritis and type 1 diabetes, as well as certain cancers and even dementia.

The University of Oxford researchers have now shown the extent to which vitamin D interacts with our DNA.

They used new DNA sequencing technology to create a map of vitamin D receptor binding across the genome in a study funded by the Medical Research Council (MRC), the MS Society, the Wellcome Trust, the Canadian MS Foundation and others. The vitamin D receptor is a protein activated by vitamin D, which attaches itself to DNA and thus influences what proteins are made from our genetic code.

The researchers found 2,776 binding sites for the vitamin D receptor along the length of the genome. These were unusually concentrated near a number of genes associated with susceptibility to autoimmune conditions such as MS, Crohn’s disease, lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, and to cancers such as chronic lymphocytic leukaemia and colorectal cancer.

They also showed that vitamin D had a significant effect on the activity of 229 genes including IRF8, previously associated with MS, and PTPN2, associated with Crohn’s disease and type 1 diabetes.

‘Our study shows quite dramatically the wide-ranging influence that vitamin D exerts over our health,’ says Dr Andreas Heger from the MRC Functional Genomics Unit at Oxford University, one of the lead authors of the study.

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Motorway

Here as a typical chart of seasonal variation in Vit D
( Northern Hemisphere )

Some points

The key point is that 25(OH)D level, ideally, needs to be kept high and stable.


The average 25(OH)D in this example is between 30nmol/l and 75nmol at these low levels, a greater faster rise in 25(OH)D occurs when given full body sun exposure.

Someone who has been supplementing and has a level above 150 nmol/l will be above this vulnerable zone.

"When your body is fully charged with vitamin D it simply doesn't make as much vitamin D when given unlimited extra sun exposure. "

"It is vitamin D starved bodies that make the most vitamin D when fully exposed to sunlight. So it's these people who experience a greater rise in vitamin D level and a longer period of disregulation of the proliferative and anti-proliferative forces."

Vieth produces evidence that this increased risk is related to widely fluctuating levels 25(OH)D in those who rely on summer sun exposure for their Vitamin D.

The latency of the intracellular enzymes that activate and destroy vitamin D explains why Vitamin D should be obtained on a regular basis and not in periodic high doses. When 25(OH)D levels fall abruptly, like in the autumn in countries far from the equator, the enzyme that makes activated Vitamin D inside the cell is still set on low and the enzyme that destroys activated Vitamin D is still set on high and it takes several weeks or even months to fully reset.

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So if you want to enjoy some SUN
get your Vitamin D levels Adequate and Stable First
for many reasons imo

How safe is supplementation ?

The point Vieth makes in the first paper is that any sudden change in level (either up or down) is potentially harmful, as it allows a period of imbalance between the pro and anti proliferative controls.

Those people regularly taking D3 daily will not experience ANY change in status as their level will always be at the maximum their body stabilizes.

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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19364661

"Evidence from clinical trials shows, with a wide margin of confidence, that a prolonged intake of 10,000 IU/d of vitamin D(3) poses no risk of adverse effects for adults, even if this is added to a rather high physiologic background level of vitamin D."

"It generally takes prolonged (many months) intake of more than 40,000iu/daily before levels above 375nmol/l are reached and the possibility of adverse events is significant. Indeed it may be that 500nmol/l is the level where adverse events are recorded."


T

he lack of vitamin D toxicity with megadose of daily ergocalciferol (D2) therapy: a case report and literature review.
Stephenson DW, Peiris AN.
Department of Endocrinology, Mountain Home VAMC, Mountain Home, TN , USA.
Abstract

The maximum daily dose of vitamin D currently recommended is 2000 IU. Ergocalciferol (D2) 50,000 IU orally weekly for 8-12 weeks is often used to treat vitamin D deficient patients (25(OH) vitamin D <20 ng/mL).



We report a case of a 56-year-old woman who received supratherapeutic doses of ergocalciferol (150,000 IU orally daily) for 28 years without toxicity. We discuss the possible mechanisms which may account for a lack of toxicity despite intake of massive daily doses of ergocalciferol in this patient.

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Where I have arrived is to take 7000iu of D3 Everyday
and Enjoy the Sun when I can as well..

Young Healthy Skin can make maybe as much as 50000iu a day
in the middle of the Day on a Tropical Beach..

So 7000iu ?

DYOR
and Answer the question in a way that is best for you..

Is there any good reason to be Vitamin D deficient ?



Motorway

motorway said:

The key point is that 25(OH)D level, ideally, needs to be kept high and stable.




Motorway

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What evidence do you have for this statement.
How have humans been able to survive in all climates for thousands of years.
What if a varying vit D level is normal. What if we cope just fine with varying vit d levels.
And just because something is safe does not mean we should all be taking it.
Vit D is safe, thats not an issue.
But thats not a reason to take it.

There is no proven reason to take vitamin D supplementation.
Not even osteoporosis and bone fractures have been proven to be reduced by taking extra vitamin D.
There must be statistical proof before making any recommendations for any members of the public regarding any medicines or supplements.
Im sure people remember Thalidomide.
Where's the studies? Associations and links do not make for treatment.

btw, im a big fan of wychoff.

Broadway said:

What evidence do you have for this statement.
How have humans been able to survive in all climates for thousands of years.
What if a varying vit D level is normal. What if we cope just fine with varying vit d levels.
And just because something is safe does not mean we should all be taking it.
Vit D is safe, thats not an issue.
But thats not a reason to take it.

There is no proven reason to take vitamin D supplementation.
Not even osteoporosis and bone fractures have been proven to be reduced by taking extra vitamin D.
There must be statistical proof before making any recommendations for any members of the public regarding any medicines or supplements.
Im sure people remember Thalidomide.
Where's the studies? Associations and links do not make for treatment.

btw, im a big fan of wychoff.

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Hi Broadway .. There is a series of vids posted earlier by Reinhold Vieth
That explains the issue of why stable levels are optimum

It relates to how the Genome Evolved and under what conditions


That sets up how the Body manages Vitamin D ( Not evolved to deal with Fluctuation )
In that series is also the Richard Doll RCT Study
which compares the mortilty curves for Smoking with Low D and Hip Fracture.

That it is in that series that was why I posted it.
And of course that is already outdated by later research



REINHOLD VIETH PhDProfessor
Departments of Nutritional Sciences, Laboratory Medicine,
and Pathobiology
University of Toronto
Director, Bone and Mineral Laboratory
Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
Mount Sinai Hospital600 University Avenue
Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5G 1X5
Phone: +1.416.586.5920
Fax: +1.416.586.8628
E-mail: rvieth@mtsinai.on.ca

click here for his research

Google Scholar: http://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&lr=&q=author:"R+Vieth"&btnG=Search

PubMed: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?CMD=search&db=PubMed&term=vieth+r[au]


Just put Vitamin D into PUBMED
along with anything you are interested in

eg

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20219962

Randomized trial of vitamin D supplementation to prevent seasonal influenza A in schoolchildren.


Also I know how I feel
and How others close to me have been effected..

I have seen the Blood Tests
I have also Seen the changes in other metabolic measurements

Not even osteoporosis and bone fractures have been proven to be reduced by taking extra vitamin D.

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Have you searched this in Pubmed ?

Give it a Try

Or were the trials in the second Heany Vid not convincing either ?

13 osteoporosis & Fractures
5 Falls

RCTs level one evidence

30 RCTs mentioned in that Vid



The only thing Drug companies are doing are trying to come up with
synthetic Vitamin D analogues that they can Patent ..

I wonder why ?

Motorway

I saw a TV program a few days ago called "Skin Deep". Unfortunately I missed the start but I gathered it was mainly about a couple of prof's reserching the genome of Neanderthal man to determine if he was more black or white and the evolutionary effect of the genome in relation to skin colour. Apparently they found some skeletel remains in Spain and extracted some DNA... and reckon he was more whiteish than previously thought.

But Vitamin D came up quite often in terms of the genetic makeup and how different cultures obtained their Vitamin D, ie some cannot absorb enough through the skin and exposure to sunlight alone.

If I recall correctly a bit of a side issue from their research is the increasing rate of cosmopolitan blending of cultures and the genitic mix of the new generations that is not idealy suited to their new enviornment, lifestyle and diet, that Vitamin D uptake in particular (and some other nutrient issues) is regulated by your genetic makeup but people tend to incorrectly think one size fits all in terms of requirements. Black people have particular health issues in western society because they don't get enough Vitamin D because of higher Melanin levels and genetically adversely predisposed to 'western food'.

Black skin Americans apparently have higher rates of diabetes, hypertension, osteoporosis, some types of cancer and memory loss because they are very deficient in Vitamin D. I don't recall atm how they said the blacks got a better balance in their native enviornment.

The point that struck a cord with me is that your genitic makeup determines your nutritional requirements and how you perform in a particular enviornment, or as motorwar says, how the Genome Evolved and under what conditions.

From my earlier involvement in Plant Breeding programs with hybridisation varitiey selection and tissue culture trials, I was involved with inbreding varities that were then selectively crossed ( hybridised) and saw some quite extreme differences in performance, both growth rate and size, quality and quanity of fruit, ie how they metabalised the same set of nutrients, differently.

I can even claim credit for going against the norm in the 1990's of assuming that one nutrition program fits all varities of a particular fruit and doing my own research via soil and sap analysis to identify that one variety that was written off as a poor performer actually performed better than the norm if the Nitrogen application rate was substantially reduced and Phosphate and Potasssium and their associated trace elements were increased. While I was a registered Plant Breeder at the time, I didn't renew my registration, but I later convinced the main plant breeder in the industry to produce the particular hybrid and tweek the nutrient program accordingly in his advisories to growers and it has since become one of the main varities in the industry.

The siginificant point I can relate to is that when you start substantially meddling with the genome, in the Vitamin D issue in particular, via the Natural Hybridisation of people across cultures you have to expect some very different nutritional requirements to crop up with the aesthetics.

Many people also probably don't know how the so called 'Ideal' or recommended levels are arrived at. Best quess, trial and error.

Motorway: Vit D is fat soluble. It can therefore be stored in the body, unlike e.g. Vit C which will simply be excreted via the kidneys if excess is taken.

Given your promotion of people taking this vitamin, could you please comment on Vit D toxicity.

After You have watched the Vids
and read Vieths paper on toxicity ( That says almost everything you need to know . I would have thought ? )

If you need to..

Read this page

http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/

Then This page

http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/vitaminDPhysiology.shtml

Then This

http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/vitaminDToxicity.shtml

To at least get some background..

Given your promotion of people taking this vitamin, could you please comment on Vit D toxicity

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I have

No promotion
Information


Vitamin D is something interesting to find out about
Could be very important
But People have to make the decisions for themselves
it is a fascinating topic.

I am sharing
I take it you do not supplement with Vitamin D
have you ever had you levels checked ?

How about sharing something ?

Julia ,you have to do the reading and Study.. If you have an interest ( You do not have to )

It does not work that I can do that for you..

CALCITRIOL (1,25(OH)2D3 OR 1,25D3) We are Not talking About this

Or this CALCIDIOL (25(OH)D3 OR 25D3)

But This CHOLECALCIFEROL (VITAMIN D3)

This is not a Hormone
This is Not a pre Hormone

What did you make of Vieths comments on this in his Vid Series ?
I though he was pretty clear ???

Those vids were for the General Public, after all.


It does not work That I can watch the Vids for you or do the reading.


You tell me something interesting about Toxicity !
There are some interesting cases maybe you have a few ?

eg
The woman who tried to murder her Husband with pure Vitamin D Crystals
She swapped it for the sugar in the house... He and her Son took
massive doses over a long period.. Did not work !

And This

CHOLECALCIFEROL, NOT ERGOCALCIFEROL, IS SAFE

Although there are documented cases of pharmacological overdoses from ergocalciferol, the only documented case of pharmacological””not industrial””toxicity from cholecalciferol we could find in the literature was intoxication from an over-the-counter supplement called Prolongevity.

On closer inspection, it seemed more like an industrial accident but it was interesting because it gave us some idea of the safety of cholecalciferol. The capsules consumed contained up to 430 times the amount of cholecalciferol contained on the label (2,000 IU). The man had been taking between 156,000–2,604,000 IU of cholecalciferol a day (equivalent to between 390–6,500 of the 400 unit capsules) for two years. He recovered uneventfully after proper diagnosis, treatment with steroids, and sunscreen.

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yes Vit D can be stored But I have already posted the blood levels required inorder
to meet immediate needs and those needed to leave some over for storage
and That was in an optimally healthy body.. How did you miss that ?

I suspect as you said you are not really interested.

I am sure when there is a subject we are both interested in we can have a great discussion ..

Whiskers You bring up a key point
So does Broadway

But I think he missed it

Motorway

This is a good one
I look forward to your informed comments Julia

http://www.direct-ms.org/pdf/VitDVieth/Vit_D_Sugar_Poisoning.pdf

the patient and his father had
consumed more than 1·3 g of vitamin D3 per month, or
42 000 µg/day (1 700 000 IU/day), in vast excess of the
minimal toxic level (95 g, 3800 IU per day),
for 7 months.

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All known poisonings of adults with vitamin D3 reflect
misuse on an industrial scale. Huge excesses of vitamin
D3 have been added in error to milk, or to a food supplement.

There are two reports of households where industrial concentrates of vitamin D3 were mistaken for cooking oil.

In contrast, all reports of iatrogenic vitamin D intoxication of adults have involved vitamin D2, a synthetic analogue of the physiological
compound, vitamin D3.

Our cases offer a perspective into the risks, management and prognosis of the worst
possible form of vitamin D3 toxicity.

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Motorway

Vitamin D deficiencies linked to onset of autoimmune lung disease

Vitamin D deficiency could be linked to the development and severity of certain autoimmune lung diseases, according to a new study.

Brent Kinder, MD, UC Health pulmonologist, director of the Interstitial Lung Disease Center at the University of Cincinnati and lead investigator on the study, says vitamin D deficiencies have been found to affect the development of other autoimmune diseases, like lupus and type 1 diabetes.

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from: http://www.sify.com/news/vitamin-d-...g-disease-news-international-lberahhieei.html

Here is a nice description relating to Toxicty using Vitamin A as a guide


From Dr John Cannell

The key is having the proper ratio of vitamin D to vitamin A in your body. To obtain this proper D/A ratio, you must make a choice. (1) Either obtain the D/A ratio Nature intended””that is, the ratio the human genome evolved on””or (2) assume one knows better and intervene in a closed system, bypass the controls in the intestine, and inject active A directly into your blood by taking vitamin A or cod liver oil.

Vitamin A production is tightly controlled in the body, the source (substrate) being carotenoids from vegetables in your intestine. The body uses these carotenoid substrates to make exactly the right amount of retinol for your body. That is, it is a closed, tightly regulated, system, one designed to perfection by Nature.

When you take vitamin A as retinol, such as in cod liver oil, you intervene in this closed system and bypass the controls. Proceed at your peril.Vitamin D is also a closed, controlled system and I don't recommend intervening in that system either.

Vitamin D cholecalciferol is a substrate like carotenoids, it is not the active substance.

Taking vitamin A as retinol is like taking activated vitamin D (calcitriol). Doing so bypasses controls and I have never recommended anyone take activated vitamin D except patients with renal failure under the care of a nephrologist.

As long as your vitamin D (cholecalciferol) dose is not excessive, you are not intervening in a closed system, you are simply providing the vitamin D substrate. The body, if and when it has enough vitamin D substrate, will use what it needs and dispose of, or store, the rest.

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Vitamin D cholecalciferol is a substrate like carotenoids

As long as your vitamin D (cholecalciferol) dose is not excessive, you are not intervening in a closed system, you are simply providing the vitamin D substrate.

The body, if and when it has enough vitamin D substrate, will use what it needs and dispose of, or store, the rest.


cholecalciferol = D3

Posted this in another Thread..


And just on Vitamin A

http://www.aolnews.com/2010/05/24/study-many-sunscreens-may-be-accelerating-cancer/

WASHINGTON (May 24) -- Almost half of the 500 most popular sunscreen products may actually increase the speed at which malignant cells develop and spread skin cancer because they contain vitamin A or its derivatives, according to an evaluation of those products released today.

AOL News also has learned through documents and interviews that the Food and Drug Administration has known of the potential danger for as long as a decade without alerting the public, which the FDA denies.

The study was released with Memorial Day weekend approaching. Store shelves throughout the country are already crammed with tubes, jars, bottles and spray cans of sunscreen.

The white goop, creams and ointments might prevent sunburn. But don't count on them to keep the ultraviolet light from destroying your skin cells and causing tumors and lesions, according to researchers at Environmental Working Group.

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Motorway

Might have to check my levels.

Doctor might not be too happy, as he tests for me quite a few things already

Happy said:

Might have to check my levels.

Doctor might not be too happy, as he tests for me quite a few things already

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Testing is a VERY GOOD idea...The Vit D test has not been available for that long (Only a few years I think )

Doctor should not care.. And you then have a real basis to work from..

we do not get around without out clothes anymore
We do not hunt and gather fresh game and fish Daily..

You will have seen the TV ads against any SUN exposure

So Many live in a Vitamin D vacuum

We work 9 to 5 etc
We avoid mid day sun ( when we can make Vitamin D )



Why governments are selling Vitamin D short ( Though things are changing and the trials are flowing )
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/11180df8-beaa-11de-b4ab-00144feab49a.html#axzz1A8KS9x98

In the 1950s and 1960s, when American and other dietary guidelines first specified vitamin D intakes of up to 400 IU for adults, nobody understood that vitamin D could do anything other than regulate calcium. And since 200 IU is enough to prevent rickets in children – assuming they have at least a moderate amount of calcium in their diet – it was assumed that 200 IU was sufficient. It was only in the following decades, as scientists came to understand how vitamin D works in our bodies, that the picture changed.

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Whiskers this was your point !



The purpose of this thread is to raise some awareness
because Vitamin D is different
to all the other supplements ...

On recent blood tests I have seen the normal range was stated as 50 to 150
( but believe other labs have higher range )


People who do get full sun exposure year round ( lifeguards )

have higher levels..

But even the middle of the accepted range is a big improvement on even recent
recommendations.. And where many people will be at..

Motorway

If you have only a small amount of D in your body, it will all be used by the kidneys to produce calcitriol and maintain blood calcium levels. But when there is more vitamin D available, something very different happens. As scientists have discovered in recent decades, it’s not only the kidneys that can make calcitriol from the calcidiol produced in the liver. Many tissues throughout the body can as well. These tissues use the hormone locally, within the cells, to regulate their behaviour.

“Calcidiol is like a blank piece of paper,” Vieth explains. “And calcitriol is like the message written on to it. Calcitriol is needed by our bodies to convey many kinds of messages, and virtually every cell in our body has a receptor that can read and respond to it.”

The first real evidence for the cancer-fighting properties of vitamin D emerged in the early 1980s, when researchers found that if they added calcitriol to immature malignant leukaemia cells, the cells would stop growing. They could only guess why this was, but scientists have since shown that vitamin D interacts with an unusually large number of genes and has the apparent ability to turn them on and off.

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We see this here is this Study Published: December 14, 2010


Vitamin D Induction of the Human Antimicrobial Peptide Cathelicidin in the Urinary Bladder

http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0015580

Study details

The Stockholm-based scientists analyzed vitamin D blood levels in 22 postmenopausal and six premenopausal Swedish women. An additional eight women with a median age of 62 were recruited to participate in a supplementation trial (2000 units per day of D3 for 12 weeks).

The Swedish researchers note that 1,25(OH)2D was measured in bladder cell cultures, which indicated that the cells of the bladder are capable of producing the active form of the vitamin.

Results from the supplementation trial showed that 25-hydroxyvitamin D3 was associated with an induction in the expression of cathelicidin when bladder biopsies were exposed to E. coli. No general induction of the antimicrobial peptide was observed during vitamin D supplementation, added the researchers.

“Here we show that oral 25D3 supplementation of healthy postmenopausal women prepares the bladder tissue to fight E. coli infection by increased production of cathelicidin upon bacterial contact,” report the researchers. “25D3 is locally converted to 1,25D3 in bladder epithelial cells, binds to vitamin D receptor, which leads to […] synthesis of cathelicidin.

“The increased production in turn enhances the direct antibacterial effect on uropathogenic E. coli,” they added.

An alternative to antibiotics ?

“In light of the emerging resistance to antibiotics used against UTI, new treatment strategies are needed,” report the researchers. “Our data suggest that vitamin D can stimulate an increased production of the antimicrobial peptide cathelicidin. By inducing and activating cathelicidin with vitamin D, a local rather than a systemic effect can be achieved.

“This could offer selective and site-specific treatment of pathogens without perturbing commensal microbes elsewhere in the body.”

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"Determining the vitamin D status of individuals with a history of UTI may be of importance to evaluate their ability to fend off intruding bacteria.

Supplementation to restore proper vitamin D levels may therefore help preparing the bladder epithelium to mount a stronger and faster immune response once bacteria enter the bladder."



OK if there is a Vit D 3 deficiency... these Cathelicidins are not going to be expressed
as they should..

refer to the first Short Vid in this Thread by Dr Cannell

and Also the second Heany Vid...


Dr Cannell on what does it take to have a "FULL TANK"

In a recent study, Heaney, et al expanded on Bruce Hollis's seminal work by analyzing five studies in which both the parent compound (cholecalciferol) and 25(OH)D levels were measured. They found that the body does not reliably begin storing cholecalciferol in fat and muscle tissue until 25(OH)D levels get above 50 ng/ml (125 nmol/L).

The average person starts to store cholecalciferol at 40 ng/ml (100 nmol/L), but at 50 ng/ml (125 nmol/L) virtually everyone begins to store it for future use.

That is, at levels below 50 ng/ml (125 nmol/L), the body uses up vitamin D as fast as you can make it, or take it, indicating chronic substrate starvation””not a good thing.

25(OH)D levels should be between 50–80 ng/ml (125–200 nmol/L), year-round.

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Motorway

PS I have not seen much Sun lately

JUST RAIN RAIN AND MORE RAIN

Are there any symptoms when level of Vitamin D is too low?

(Sorry if it was mentioned already, must have missed it)

motorway said:

Maybe not a lot until the wheels fall off

Vitamin D allows the intelligence in the DNA Library inside each cell to be unlocked
(It has only been recently been realized what the entire Blueprint of the genome is doing inside each and every cell )

So with optimal Vitamin D , Everything works as and when it should

Ie insulin , immune system , blood pressure , brain , mood , calcium /bones
Heart , Muscle Strength etc

You name it... You are a living system with intelligence rife..cells communicating with each other ... Command and control systems all in place

Ready to meet any challenge..

Ok low vitamin D is like deciding to never check the oil air water or ever service
your car But just drive ( and with your eyes shut ) and throw out the manual...

For a while nothing will seem to happen
Until ..Something breaks down

And then maybe your dead
and in between you just do not feel well with aches and pains etc


johenmo


Also most official recommendations are conservative still based on outdated models
The Understanding of Vitamin D is only very new eg what I have said above

Even recommendations For osteoporsis are too low ( SAILS for you ) ( still based on Rickets model )



And that is still just focusing on Bone Health..

This is important ... The old model saw Vitamin D just involved with Bones
BUT only 15% is for bones .. 85% is used by all the other cells in the body when they
need to do something intelligent.. eg A Heart Beating


See the Plate of the old scheme D for calcium/bones
Second is recent understanding Given optimal D
85% is for all the other cells and processes

ONLY 15% for bones

It only seemed that it was all for Bones
Because people were deficient and
Bones is where it all goes until there is optimal levels..





So one thing you could get without sufficient D is cancer
or maybe Diabetes or Heart Disease
or Depression or whatever breaks down first..

eg cancer




Breaking a Hip is a terrible thing to happen when you are over 50

You need levels of D where there is no limit on cells ability to self regulate
The Threshold where all The Vitamin D Tanks are FULL

motorway

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From Mister Mark

Thank you for the info. The reason i asked the question is we live on the east coast and my wife recently had a blood test and was for the first time diagnosed with low vitamin D
She has worked in a large shopping centre for 4 years now, previously a lot more time was spent outdoors.
In this time she has experienced more colds and gets fatigued much more easily and has just come down with a bad dose of broncitis, symptoms we atributed to being in air condiyioning and getting older, interesting to read this info.
Thank you

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Name Anything and very likely Vitamin D will be involved...


Mayo Clinic Study Suggests Those Who Have Chronic Pain May Need to Assess Vitamin D Status


As Reinhold Vieth stated in the last video

Feeling BETTER...


"'HOW MUCH VITAMIN D SHOULD I TAKE?

Again, we don't know. This is a difficult question because it relies on so many personal factors. Everyone's situation is either a lot, or at least a little, different. How much vitamin D you need varies with age, body weight, percent of body fat, latitude, skin coloration, season of the year, use of sunblock, individual variation in sun exposure, and””probably””how ill you are.

As a general rule, old people need more than young people, big people need more that little people, heavier people need more than skinny people, northern people need more than southern people, dark-skinned people need more than fair-skinned people, winter people need more than summer people, sunblock lovers need more than sunblock haters, sun-phobes need more than sun worshipers, and ill people may need more than well people.Quite a few factors are involved, as you can see. However, don't feel bad, no one understands it. Vitamin D is used by the body””metabolically cleared””both to maintain wellness and to treat disease.

If you get an infection, how much vitamin D does your body use up fighting the infection? If you have cancer, how much vitamin D does your body use up fighting the cancer? If you have heart disease, how much vitamin D does your body use up fighting the heart disease? If you are a child with autism, how much vitamin D does your brain need to turn on the genes that autism has turned off? If you are an athlete, how much vitamin D does your body use to make you stronger and quicker? Nobody knows the answer to these questions."

Professor Robert Heaney of Creighton University just discovered that if you take 2,200 IU of vitamin D every day, you only have about 12 days supply of vitamin D in your bodyI love Robert Heaney's papers. In a previous paper, Dr. Heaney discovered that at blood levels of 35 ng/mL (87.5 nmol/L), a large number of people are using up their vitamin D as quickly as they take it.

That is, they are not storing any for future use and suffer from chronic substrate starvation. Obviously, one wants to take enough so the body has all it can use, which is why I recommend 25(OH)D levels of at least 50 ng/mL (125 nmol/L).

At that level, no one should have chronic substrate starvation.In the paper below, Dr. Heaney collaborated with two other Creighton scientists, Dr. Diane Cullen and Dr. Laura Armas, as well as one of the premier experts in measuring vitamin D in the world, Dr. Ron Horst of Heartland Assays. Ron runs tens of thousands of vitamin D samples a year as Heartland Assays performs vitamin D testing for most of the big studies and Dr. Horst is one of the few people in the world who can accurately measure cholecalciferol, and not just 25(OH)D.

Anyway, in his latest paper, Dr. Heaney found that if you regularly take 2,200 IU per day, you have about 12 days supply of vitamin D in your body. He explained, "What this indicates is that fat reserves of the vitamin are essentially running on empty and that . . . additional vitamin D inputs are [converted to 25(OH)D] almost immediately . . . The currently recommended intake of vitamin D needs to be revised upward by at least an order of magnitude.

"What is not known, at least by me, is what happens when cholecalciferol intake far exceeds the body's requirement. We know it is stored in the body, mainly in fat and muscle, but what does the body do to control excess cholecalciferol from building up in the body? Professor Reinhold Vieth has written that much of it will simply be excreted unchanged in the bile, but how does that system work exactly, to get rid of excess cholecalciferol?

We know it works because the few patients with vitamin D toxicity reported in the literature””almost always due to industrial errors””reduce their vitamin D levels rather quickly by simply stopping the vitamin D and staying out of the sun.

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"That is, they are not storing any for future use and suffer from chronic substrate starvation. Obviously, one wants to take enough so the body has all it can use, which is why I ( John CANNELL ) recommend 25(OH)D levels of at least 50 ng/mL (125 nmol/L). "


Happy.. It is about being and feeling how we should
...

Look at the Study on urinary Tract infection
With Vitamin D ... The messages with the correct information get sent
and the immune system mobilizes.....
etc

Motorway

Some more on Toxicity for Julia

Can we overdose?

One of the debates surrounding vitamin D is whether too much can be toxic. The US’s Institute of Medicine’s recommendations – unchanged since 1997 – were influenced in part by a 1984 study concluding that 3,800 IU of vitamin D per day could cause hypercalcemia, or too much calcium in the blood. Symptoms include kidney stones, vomiting and muscle atrophy.

But the 1984 study was flawed: it failed to measure the amount of vitamin D administered; based on the findings of other studies, it now looks as though subjects were given 100 times more vitamin D than intended.Moreover, how could it be that 3,800 IU was toxic, when 20 minutes of midday sunbathing in the summer makes at least 10,000 IU of vitamin D in our bodies?

In 1999, Reinhold Vieth published a review of vitamin D research in response to the IOM conclusions. In it, he argued that there was no evidence that amounts lower than 20,000 IU a day could be toxic. “Throughout my preparation of this review, I was amazed at the lack of evidence supporting statements about the toxicity of moderate doses of vitamin D,” Vieth wrote.

Studies have since shown 10,000 IU a day of vitamin D to be safe. While any substance will become toxic in excess, vitamin D researchers today accept that the current vitamin D recommendations could be more than quadrupled with no fear of toxicity.

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So Do Your OWN Research...


Modern Lifestyles can be and often are. Far removed from what the Genome is adapted to deal with..


In this thread that is Vitamin D levels


Think of
Shift Workers, office workers
SUN avoidance,,, disrupted Sleep patterns... A long list

And perversely an unhealthy SUN exposure ( when it does occur )

Genes are switched on and OFF
GENES are not FATE
They interact with Environment...
Genes are expressed

The expression of genes in an organism can be influenced by the environment, including the external world in which the organism is located or develops, as well as the organism's internal world, which includes such factors as its hormones and metabolism. One major internal environmental influence that affects gene expression is gender, as is the case with sex-influenced and sex-limited traits.

Similarly, drugs, chemicals, temperature, and light are among the external environmental factors that can determine which genes are turned on and off, thereby influencing the way an organism develops and functions.

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And interesting issue is the different effects of UVB versus UVA radiation..

This connects to the earlier... abstract on Melanoma and office workers.

You do not need to use a SUNBED to get too much UVA
and miss out on UVB...

Motorway

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19968819

Pigment Cell Melanoma Res. 2010 Feb;23(1):57-63. Epub 2009 Dec 2.
UVA tanning is involved in the increased incidence of skin cancers in fair-skinned young women.

Coelho SG, Hearing VJ.
Laboratory of Cell Biology, National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA.
Abstract

Melanomas are the most prevalent cancers in 25-29 yr old females and compose roughly 12% of cancers in 20-40 yr old women; under the age of 40, women have a higher incidence of melanomas than do men. Within the past few decades, the alarming trend to use commercial sunlamps for cosmetic pigmentation is of particular concern, especially since 71% of those patrons are women with 50% of patrons under the age of 29. A major problem may be the use of UVA-rich sunlamps which produce a visible tan but afford little to no protection from subsequent UV exposure. We hypothesize that the additional exposure of adolescents to unnaturally large amounts of UVA from artificial UV sources is implicated in the increasing incidence of malignant melanomas disproportionately in young women.
PMID: 19968819 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]PMCID: PMC2810005 [Available on 2011/2/1]

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