Stopped Your Vitamin D for the Summer? Think Again!

Every year a few patients stop their vitamin D for the summer usually because they spend more time outdoors. Yet with few exceptions, their vitamin D levels fall to dangerously low levels. What gives?

We don’t really know why vitamin D levels are falling. Vitamin D production begins when our skin is exposed to ultraviolet light in sunlight. Sunscreen use blocks ultraviolet rays and could play a role in low vitamin D levels.

Some experts suspect that low fat diets may play a role because vitamin D is made from cholesterol. Vitamin D can be passed from mother to child in the womb. Mothers eating a supposedly healthy low fat diet would offer less vitamin D to their new baby.

Trevor Marshall, PhD suspects that microorganisms enter the blood via a leaky gut and shut down vitamin D receptors as a means of survival. This will lower vitamin D levels as the body won’t waste resources making more vitamin D than it needs. I see the dose of vitamin D needed to maintain a healthy levels falls as gut health improves.

I theorize that we are no longer getting light energy from food. This could explain why most of us don’t get enough vitamin D from sunlight exposure. Light energy is stored in plants via photosynthesis, but by the time the food reaches your grocer a week or so later, the light energy has dissipated. Light energy is refined out of processed foods.

According to vitamin D researcher Michael Holick, PhD, 25-hydroxy-vitamin D3 levels should be 50 – 55 mg/ml for the general population, 80 for people with mood issues, autoimmune or inflammatory conditions and 100 for people who have had cancer.

So please, continue your vitamin D through the summer.

Also in the news, UMKC study shows RDA for vitamin D too low, by power of 10!

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