Have you seen the cool thing that google is doing with their Project 10 to the 100th program? They’re providing 10 millions bucks to fund good ideas that help as many people as possible.

There are a bunch of categories for these ideas and one of them is health as described here:
Health: How can we help individuals lead longer, healthier lives?

How about funding a good vitamin D study? Does that fit the bill or what? Imagine treating everyone in the Country (and world) for their vitamin D deficiencies. Imagine the far reaching positive effects of quality research supporting all of the theories floating around about vitamin D right now. How about community health screening tests put into place as a result of this? The possibilities are endless! Perhaps someone over at the Vitamin D Council will jump on this? Maybe the readers of this blog send in a proposal for something to do with vitamin D and see what happens!

Italian researchers have found a link between vitamin D and the risk of developing a melanoma and they say that individuals with certain variants in a vitamin D-related gene, called BsmI, may be at an increased risk of developing melanoma.

Read the more scientific version of this new vitamin D study

A professor of public health in Scotland draws attention to the possible public health ramifications of low vitamin D:
We must waste no time putting the sunshine vitamin to the test

Here’s a quote from his article:

“the best way forward is a large-scale, Scotland-wide trial of the effectiveness and costs of vitamin D supplementation. Fortunately, we have been planning this very study for the past 15 months, with many vitamin D experts and enthusiasts (including Oliver Gillie and Dr Helga Rhein).”

Here’s a good news story about a doctor who’s fire-up about vitamin D:

Doctor preaches wonder cure: Vitamin D

“It reduces pain. It reduces illness. There is almost nothing that vitamin D can’t help, and that’s Dr. Greg Plotnikoff’s point.”

Even though I just made a post I had to post this one since it’s a big story hitting the news wires today (and it looks like my double-header is going to be rained-out!)

Vitamin D Levels Might Predict Risk for MS - Children with lower levels of vitamin D seem to be at a higher risk of being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

One thing that’s really becoming obvious at our clinic these days is how quickly a properly built-up vitamin D level can drop. One example of this is a women who had her levels up to 80 ng/Ml back in June. She did this by taking 10,000 IU’s daily for 2 months. With the start of summer she lowered her dose to 5,000 IU’s daily and just completed her re-check during the middle week of Sept. Her level is now 51 ng/Ml, still good but substantially lower considering we just made it through the high point of our vitamin D season. One of the ways we’re addressing some of these in between dosing challenges is by having patients take 5,000 IU’s Mon-Fri and then 10,000 on Saturday and Sunday.

I’ve found a couple of recent vitamin D headlines and posted them below…

The Sunshine Vitamin May Relieve Diabetic Pain - Vitamin D may help relieve a painful neurological condition in people with diabetes known as neuropathy, according to a new study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Death Rate from Cancer Slashed 55 Percent with High Vitamin D Levels - A higher vitamin D intake can decrease your risk of dying from cancer by 55 percent, new research has shown. After adjusting for a variety of confounding factors, the researchers found that people with the highest blood levels of 25(OH)D had a 55 percent lower risk of dying from cancer than those with the lowest levels.

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Here’s a good little article about folks with gut problems and how vitamin D might benefit them:

Vitamin D a Bone Booster for People with Digestive Problems

Happy Reading!

Darcy

It just doesn’t stop, the stories keep pouring in. Can you imagine the number of kids unknowingly suffering from vitamin D deficiency?

“Gordon and fellow researchers discovered that 42 percent of adolescents were vitamin D deficient. Vitamin D deficiency was twice as common in teens as we assumed it would be.”

Another story about a teen with low vitamin D

There are a couple of interesting blog posts over on The Heart Scan Blog. I enjoy reading this blog since the doc running it is on the same page as my wife on several health issues. I’d say anyone with cholesterol problems would do well to read the blog regularly.

Post #1
How much vitamin D should I take

Post#2
Some basic vitamin D issues

It’s turning out to be a very nice sunny September around here. I am noticing a lot of long shadows for the bulk of the day, which some folks use to gauge if it’s a good vitamin D day or not. Long shadows equal poor vitamin D rays since the sun is not high in the sky. Still, after the blink of a summer we had, I’ll take it!

Yet another new study about vitamin D and children

More than 93% of youth in each age and sex group had suboptimal vitamin D concentrations.
Read the entire article - Low Vitamin D Status in a Representative Sample of Youth From Quebec, Canada
CONCLUSIONS: Inadequate vitamin D status is a potentially serious public health problem among children and adolescents in Quebec. Youth living at high latitudes in countries with and without mandatory fortification of vitamin D are likely at heightened risk of 25(OH)D deficiency. These results call for renewed efforts to ensure adequate vitamin D intake among growing children and adolescents.

Here’s more about low vitamin D and kids….

Vitamin D shifts into focus - Research shows that (vitamin D) defect can be troubling, especially among children. (Source Reuters)