By David Gutierrez

(NaturalNews) Doctors are becoming increasingly concerned about growing rates of vitamin D deficiency, leading many of them to recommend that people get more sun or even take supplements.

Vitamin D has long been known to play an important role in bone health. Deficiency can lead to osteoporosis in adults, and in children and some adults can lead to a bone-softening disease known as rickets.

Although the vitamin is synthesized by the body upon exposure to sunlight, people living far from the equator can have trouble producing enough of it in the winter time. For this reason, numerous governments began fortifying dairy products with vitamin D decades ago, leading directly to a near-elimination of rickets. The disease is starting to make a resurgence, however, even as researchers start to believe that humans may need higher levels of the vitamin than previously thought.

Although the U.S. government recommends a daily vitamin D intake of 200 to 600 IU per day, researchers are increasingly suggesting amounts of closer to 1,000 IU. These amounts are based on new studies finding that higher levels of vitamin D can help regulate the immune system and prevent chronic diseases such as cancer, heart disease and Alzheimer’s.

“It helps boost your ability to fight infection, and it also reduces some destructive inflammation in your body, including inflammation with periodontal disease,” said Mark Ryder of the University of California-San Francisco. “Every five or 10 years, a new vitamin becomes the vitamin of the moment. The hot one right now is probably vitamin D, and so far all of the evidence looks encouraging.”

Yet even according to the lower government standards, at least one in three U.S. residents are not getting enough vitamin D.

“We’ve become a culture that shuns the sunshine and doesn’t drink milk,” said Dr. Donald Abrams of San Francisco General Hospital.

Sources for this story include: www.sfgate.com.

Link: http://bit.ly/cIiIkj

By Alan Mozes

THURSDAY, May 13 (HealthDay News) — Seventy percent of pregnant women in the United States don’t get enough vitamin D, new research reveals.

What’s more, the regimen of prenatal vitamins that many women take do not always provide enough vitamin D to boost levels when needed, researchers from the University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine (UCDSM) and Massachusetts General Hospital cautioned.

“Prenatal vitamins do help raise vitamin D levels, but many women start taking them after becoming pregnant,” UCDSM’s Dr. Adit Ginde said in a news release. “Although research is ongoing, I think it’s best for women to start a few months before becoming pregnant to maximize the likely health benefits.”

The finding was published in the May issue of the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Although the study did find that some women are getting the vitamin D they need, the authors warned that many are not. Those most at risk are women with darker skin, those living in northern regions during the winter, and those who tend to cover up their skin for religious and/or cultural purposes.

In general, vitamin D levels seem to have been dropping in recent years, the researchers noted — perhaps due to a dip in outdoor activity. Vitamin D deficiency in the first years of life is associated with a higher risk for respiratory infection and childhood wheezing, while adults who lack an adequate supply bear a greater risk for heart disease and certain cancers.

Testing and supplementation could be the answer to the apparent problem. However, there may be risks from excessive vitamin D intake, the researchers said.

“We need more data from clinical trials of vitamin D supplementation in pregnant women,” study co-author Dr. Carlos Camargo, of Massachusetts General, said in the news release. “If the ongoing trials continue to show benefit, the best strategy will likely be measuring vitamin D levels through a simple blood test and choosing supplementation doses according to those levels.”

Link: http://bit.ly/aA3KM4

By Bill Hendrick, WebMD Health News Reviewed by Laura J. Martin, MD

Low vitamin D levels are commonly observed in children in northern states, often due to insufficient sunlight and dietary intake.

But emerging research indicates that young people who live in the South, where sunlight is ample, also have low vitamin D levels.

Vitamin D promotes bone growth and other important body functions. The body uses sunshine to make vitamin D, and it is also found in some foods. Vitamin D and Teens

Researchers measured vitamin D levels in 559 African-American and white adolescents between 14 and 18 in Augusta, Ga., which gets plenty of sunlight year-round. Vitamin D levels were tested in all four seasons of the year.

Kids were excluded if they were taking medications or had chronic medical conditions that might affect growth and development or affect study results.

Of the 559 participants, 49% were female, 51% male, 45% African-American, and 55% white.

Researchers say participants were in various stages of maturation and that 268 of the 274 girls had started menstruation.

About half (56.4 %) of the youths tested had vitamin D insufficiency, meaning the level was low but not affecting health. But 28.8% had vitamin D deficiency — a level low enough to cause health problems.

The vitamin D levels were lowest in winter. But African-American teenagers had significantly lower vitamin D levels in every season of the year, compared to white teens.

Also, adolescents with a higher body mass index had lower vitamin D levels. Vitamin D Deficiency Higher in African-Americans

Overall, the researchers write, vitamin D levels were higher in white children than in African-American teens, and higher in boys than girls.

Researchers report that: * Vitamin D insufficiency rates were 94.3% in African-American girls and 83.1% in African-American boys, compared with 29.6% in white girls and 30.3% in white boys. * Vitamin D deficiency rates were 73.8% in African-American girls and 46.9% in African-American boys, compared with only 2.6% in white girls and 3.9% in white boys. * Severe vitamin D deficiency was found only in African-American adolescents, or 5.2%. * In summer, no white kids had vitamin D deficiency, but 55% of African-American youths did.

Adults Need Vitamin D, Too

Vitamin D deficiency can result in thin, brittle, or misshapen bones; having enough Vitamin D can prevent rickets in kids. It also helps to protect older adults from osteoporosis.

Researchers say their study is one of the first to investigate vitamin D status in children in the southern part of the U.S. in African-Americans as well as whites.

They also say that low levels of vitamin D is a growing national problem for young people in the U.S. regardless of where they live.

“One of the key findings in our study is that a substantial proportion of black adolescents may be at risk for low vitamin D status not only in winter but throughout the year,” the researchers write.

Researchers say more work is needed to investigate the implications for low vitamin D status and how to improve the situation.

Link: http://bit.ly/aZpm0B

By Meredith May, Chronicle Staff Writer

One April day after weeks of rain, Daniel Jiminez took a detour on his way to class: Dolores Park in San Francisco.

He needed the sun.

“I know what they say about skin cancer, but I just feel better when I’m warm and tan,” said Jiminez, 24. “I’m sorry, but I’d rather be happy.”

Turns out doctors are coming around to his point of view. After decades of slathering on SPF protection, more people are discovering through routine medical screens that they have deficiencies in vitamin D – a hormone produced in the body by sun exposure.

As a result, doctors are seeing a resurgence of rickets and are concerned with osteoporosis in adults over 50. But for most people with low vitamin D levels, symptoms are hard to pinpoint: feeling tired, sluggish or a general malaise.

Known for causing bowed legs and fractured bones primarily in children, rickets all but disappeared in the United States in the 1930s as diets improved and vitamin D was added to certain dairy products.

But in the ensuing decades, as people turned to increasingly stronger sunscreen to ward off melanomas, and work shifted from predominantly outdoor activity to office work, vitamin D has been slowly slipping out of our systems, according to Dr. Michael Holick of Boston University Medical Center, who writes in his new book “The Vitamin D Solution” that lack of vitamin D can lead to heart disease, cancer, depression, insomnia, diabetes, chronic pain and perhaps autism.

“We’ve done studies that show that people living at higher latitudes with less sun are at higher risk of vitamin D deficiency,” Holick said.

Levels in breast milk

Another study of lactating women in South Carolina showed negligible levels of vitamin D in their breast milk. “Evolutionarily, that makes no sense when our forefathers made thousands of units of it a day,” Holick said.

National guidelines have not kept up with the dipping D levels, he said.

Federal health experts currently recommend between 200 and 600 international units of vitamin D a day. But those benchmarks are due to change this summer, as the Institute of Medicine’s Food and Nutrition Board responds to the new research about vitamin D.

“It should be 10 times that,” Holick said.

While vitamin D is found in some foods, such as wild caught salmon, fortified milk and mushrooms, it’s not enough to replenish what’s missing. Receiving serious attention

Holick has caught some flack from dermatologists for suggesting that 15 to 30 minutes of sun exposure on the legs and arms per day, a few days a week, can restore vitamin D levels. Vitamin D created via sun exposure versus supplements lasts twice as long in the body.

Despite being fired from Boston University’s department of dermatology in 2004, Holick is now getting more serious attention because of his stance. He’s Boston University’s lead vitamin D researcher, studying the vitamin’s effect on genes.

“Just a light pink color, before burning, then put on the sunscreen, will do it,” he said, adding that the face should always be protected.

Holick keeps his own vitamin D levels up with three glasses of milk, a multivitamin and a 2,000-unit vitamin D capsule each day. He plays tennis, gardens and cycles each week for brief periods with sunscreen only on his face.

But pills can also do the trick, and that’s what more doctors are suggesting.

Patients can ask doctors to do a special screen for vitamin D (the 25-hydroxyvitamin D test) that costs about $200 and may or may not be covered by insurance. The magic number doctors are looking for is at least 30, which stands for nanograms per milliliter. Prescribing further units

If levels are too low, doctors typically prescribe 50,000 units once a week for eight weeks to fill up the tank, then every two weeks thereafter. The next two months, patients take anywhere from 4,000 to 6,000 units until a healthy vitamin D level is reached. Maintenance is considered anywhere from 1,000 to 3,000 units a day.

“It’s kind of a mixed message: Do you want cancer or do you want brittle bones?” said Wren Wolf, 21, a friend who joined Jiminez on his impromptu Dolores Park picnic.

“I think it all boils down to everything in moderation.”

E-mail Meredith May at mmay@sfchronicle.com.

Link: http://bit.ly/dyJa3U

By: Jeffrey Wolf

DENVER – When we think of vitamin D, we often think of the sun, and maybe trying to spend more time outdoors. But a new study in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology says seven out of 10 pregnant women in the U.S. are not getting enough of this crucial vitamin.

Prenatal vitamins do raise vitamin D levels during pregnancy but this study shows that higher doses may be needed. That is because vitamin D has reemerged as an important nutritional factor in maternal and infant health.

If the mother has low levels of vitamin D during the pregnancy, it can have an affect on her child in its early life. The condition has been linked to increased risk of childhood wheezing and respiratory infections. Low levels in adults have been linked to cardiovascular disease and cancer.

The lead author of the study, Adit Ginde, MD, MPH, is from the University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine.

“We already know that vitamin D is important for bone health of the mother and infant, but we are just starting to scratch the surface about the many potential health benefits of vitamin D during pregnancy,” he said.

Those with darker skin or who cover their skin during the day, as well as women living in northern parts of the country are at a particularly risk for lower vitamin D levels.

However, not all women have this problem and an excess of vitamin D can be risky as well.

“We need more data from clinical trials of vitamin D supplementation in pregnant women. If the ongoing trials continue to show benefit, the best strategy will likely be measuring vitamin D levels through a simple blood test and choosing supplementation doses according to those levels. This tailored approach is common in preventive care for people with high cholesterol, and safer and more effective than a one-size-fits-all solution,” Ginde said.

His best advice, and that of other experts, is to treat vitamin D like other medications. People should have levels checked initially to see how much extra is needed. Then recheck once on supplementation to ensure levels are where they are supposed to be.

On top of taking a supplement, you can also get vitamin D from many other sources. Fortified foods like milk, cereal and yogurt, as well as other foods like eggs, have higher levels of vitamin D.

The major source for us is still sunlight, but you have to weigh getting enough vitamin D from the sun against your risk of skin cancer from sun exposure. The bottom line is that it is important to make sure your levels of vitamin D are adequate, but not too high. This is especially true if you’re pregnant.

Much like folate, another essential vitamin for a baby’s development, mothers want levels of vitamin D to be high enough before becoming pregnant.

(KUSA-TV © 2010 Multimedia Holdings Corporation)

Link: http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=137854&catid=188

By AccuWeather.com’s Victoria Atkinson

Vitamin D is now a hot topic, and not just because it as known as the sunshine vitamin.

According to James E. Dowd, MD, author of “The Vitamin D Cure,” the majority of Americans are Vitamin D deficient.

Low levels of this vitamin have correlated with an increase in cancer, diabetes, heart disease, depression, obesity and autoimmune diseases.

More than 90 percent of our total supply comes from the ultraviolet light of the sun.

The dilemma is that some people are exposed to too many harmful rays, whether natural or artificial.

Others are not getting enough sun either because they lather up in SPF or they are not outside enough.

Dowd’s book suggests spending time outside getting natural sunlight to achieve ample Vitamin D levels.

“Physicians should check Vitamin D levels as routinely as they check cholesterol and blood pressure,” said Dowd.

Linda Margusity was diagnosed with a Vitamin D deficiency and was recommended to begin a vitamin regimen.

“I believe it is easier to get Vitamin D through a supplement because you need direct rays to get it through the sun,” said Margusity.

The rays we need only hit at certain times of the year and in certain parts of the world.

“I am not going to stand outside in the winter every day for 10 minutes,” said Margusity. “If our plants don’t grow because there isn’t enough direct sunlight, how are we going to get enough Vitamin D?”

When outside in the sun, some are covering up their skin with sunscreen or makeup with high levels of SPF. After all of the years being told to lather up with sunblock, is it wiser to go without?

The Skin Cancer Foundation (SCF) does not recommend being in ultraviolet light without any sun protection.

“Our knowledge of the dangers associated with UVA rays has grown significantly over the last few decades,” said Perry Robins, MD, President, SCF. “We now know that UVA plays a direct role in skin cancer comparable to that of UVB.”

The SCF urges people to use a complete program of sun protection. Seeking shade, using protective clothing and sunglasses, and applying sunscreen are all important.

Obtaining Vitamin D from fortified juices or milk, fatty fish, or taking a vitamin supplement is smartest, according to the SCF.

“I would much rather take a supplement than get skin cancer,” Margusity said.

Link: http://bit.ly/bDCVue –