Low vitamin D

You could phone up your dodctors and ask for one of the nurses to call you back and give you some advice on how long it might take you to get back on track. I'd imagine you'll need another blod test in a while as well to see how things are going? I'm sure that Dr John Briffa has talked quite abit on Vit D deficiency on his blog; you could google it [can't do links, I'm afraid]. Do sympathise with the weight gain; my leg being sore has stopped me walking recently and my weight is creeping up because of it. Feeling miserable about it and eating more; vicious circle.

hi nanapug I think that this low vit D is quite commeon now.. my daughter (30) has been diagnosed with it.and her docs said it could be 2 yrs to fully recover, she takes a tablet every month for it.

Try and spend time outdoors as much as possible nanapug. Even weaker sunlight in autumn/winter can help to boost Vitamin D levels.

But not a lot in northern climes merlot - it has to do with wavelengths of the UV light getting filtered out when the sun is low and the UV has more air to travel through. So on mainland UK by now one has to take the pills if levels are low. And goodness knows it has not been a summer for basking in the sun has it.
Outdoors can lift the sprits though.
The richest dietary source is salmon, followed by other oily fish like mackerel and sardines. Eggs and outdoor-living meat fat/dairy fat also contains some.
I would also try to have a diet with a good amount of calcium in it nanapug. The most important thing Vit D does is allow the body to use calcium - in all kinds of ways. So a pinta day, or something equivalent?
The other things that Vit D does in the body are just being investigated, but there are receptors for it all over the place - on immune cells and elsewhere. Implying that it plays many roles.
Hope you feel better soon nanapug

Strangely enough I was in the Co-op yesterday and felt compelled to buy a tin of pilchards. Decided my body was trying to tell me something. I've also been drinking loads of milk recently; something I don't usually do.

One of the reasons I use full-fat milk is because it's higher in VitD than the skinny milks. VitD is a fat-soluble vitamin, whose best sources are animal foods (as jess has highlighted already) so the current fad with low fat everything is not helping in that respect.

A couple of years ago I heard from a friend that it is now believed that too much use of sun creams with high filters is causing a lot of people to have low vitamin D.
When I went to see the GP here in France to get prescription for Physio for my broken arm he also gave me a prescription for special doses of Vit D - they come in ampoules and you take one very three months. They are given as a matter of course to women after a certain age but I am not sure what that is.

I should be OK at the moment because I have to take calcium tablets with vit D in them to counteract the bone-thinning effects of steroids. And I managed to have one of the sunniest weeks of the summer in Suffolk, then glorious sunshine in the French Alps with Greatnan. Can one store up summer sunshine for the winter months?

My understanding is that yes you can store vitamin D for later use.

As someone who suffers from oestropenia vitamin D is very important to me to help absorb calcium.
www.nos.org.uk/page.aspx?pid=535

Yes! following a routine blood test. I was found to have high calcium and high parathyroid hormone and many tests later ended up with a diagnosis of secondary hyperparathyroidism due to Vitamin D deficiency.
I was then put on "industrial" doses of vitamin D hospital only prescription, for about 8 weeks (I think)
A DEXA scan showed a neck of femur and back joint just on the osteoporosis side of osteopenia see jodis link. I am now on Alendronic Acid and taking osteocare.

Jess has made the point about the lack of enough UV rays gettng here between October and April.

That's better, osteopenia, thought it didn't look right. nelliemossr you ok on Alendronic Acid? It made me very ill.

But Eskimos, who saw little sunlight for months every year, did not suffer from vitamin D deficiency on their traditional diet, because the high fat foods they ate (meat and fish mainly) supplied them with enough vitamin D even to last through the Arctic winters. Making vitamin D from sunlight is certainly one way, but diet can do the trick too.

Eskimos / Inuit live in the land of the midnight sun during their summers so perhaps this is helps too. I remember reading that polar bear liver is so full of vitamin D that it could kill you. Is that true dies anyone know?

Or was it vitamin A?

Yes, it is true.

Yes, it is vitamin A. I was just going to say that but had posted too soon. You beat me to it, jodi

Too much ... Can't sort out my As from my Ds.

jodi So far I am ok. I get up and ready before I take it then take it as fully directed and sit up very straight afterwards for about a hour and don't do too much bending after that. I get a lot of stomach gurgling but so far no problems with reflux or heartburn. I can tell from how my stomach feels I have taken it. I have been on it for about 3-4 months and take it once a week.

I know some people are fine with it nellie If you start getting acute heartburn see you GP. I've been moved onto daily (nightly) Strontium something and this suits me better.

Last spring I was very concerned about my son's lethargy and constant tiredness. He almost had the symptoms of M.E. I suggested a visit to his GP, as the stay-at-home parent of a baby and a 3 year old he needs every ounce of energy.
After a series of blood tests, he too was diagnosed with extremely low Vit D in his system,, his GP hadn't seen such a low count for years. As a child he might have contracted rickets!! He was given a concentrated injection, medication and good advice about sitting in the sun periodically. He has done a complete turn-around, so much so he is working from home, caring for the children and living a normal life.

A and D both fat soluble indeed and I agree with Bags - a low fat diet, particularly one low in all animal fat, can give you insufficient of these essentials. Yes sunscreen does prevent you making Vit d in your skin. I think too as we get older a lot of use expose less flesh when we are outside in the summer - trousers rather than shorts, long sleeved tops, hats etc and therefore not enough skin surface engaged with making it.
The need for Vitamin D is almost certainly why Europeans evolved pale skins. Without the pale skin (and with clothing) dark skinned people would get rickets which would have caused deformed pelvises and inability to give birth. A pretty brutal mechanism.

Sadly many Asian women from traditional backgrounds have a chronic deficiency in Vitamin D - including pregnant women.

And sometimes their babies have rickets in the UK