Higher Vitamin D Intake Needed to Reduce Cancer Risk

Just in case you're not yet convinced that you need more Vitamin D ...

Higher Vitamin D Intake Needed to Reduce Cancer Risk:

"Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and Creighton University School of Medicine in Omaha have reported that markedly higher intake of vitamin D is needed to reach blood levels that can prevent or markedly cut the incidence of breast cancer and several other major diseases than had been originally thought. The findings are published February 21 in the journal Anticancer Research.

“Now that the results of this study are in, it will become common for almost every adult to take 4000 IU/day,” Garland said. “This is comfortably under the 10,000 IU/day that the IOM Committee Report considers as the lower limit of risk, and the benefits are substantial.”

“Now is the time for virtually everyone to take more vitamin D to help prevent some major types of cancer, several other serious illnesses, and fractures,” said Heaney."

And in this just published study, Vitamin D Supplement Doses and Serum 25-Hydroxyvitamin D in the Range Associated with Cancer Prevention, researchers have determined that higher intakes of Vitamin D are perfectly safe and that our bodies, to a degree, self-regulate our levels of Vitamin D. In other words, those deficient in Vitamin D absorb more of it from supplements than someone else taking the same amount and who already has higher levels.

Make sure you're taking a sufficient amount of Vitamin D. If you're not sure about it, have your doctor to check your Vitamin D levels so you know for sure and then aim for "optimal", not just somewhere in the "normal range", which is currently under debate.

I don't know about you but I know I haven't been absorbing much sunshine over the past few months. Even when I am outside, most of my skin is covered, of course, so there's very little chance of absorbing Vitamin D from the sun. Supplements are necessary. I wish I'd understood that earlier. Maybe I still would have got breast cancer. Maybe I wouldn't have.