Low Vitamin D - what's the cause?
 

After 3 weeks I finally got the official results from my physical.

It said I had a vitamin D deficiency. It was measured at 17.4 ng/mL and the normal range is 32-100 ng/mL, with ideal being over 50 ng/mL.

It says Vitamin D is found in dairy, eggs, dark fish, and leafy green veggies. I know you can take supplements and I know the effects of low Vit. D... but what causes it? What type of doctor should I see about it? 17.4 seems REALLY low for a normal range between 32-100.

I eat two eggs for breakfast every day. My usual lunch is a spinach salad with eggs, carrots, broccoli, croutons, bacon bits, grape tomatoes, and sunflower seeds with one of those small little cartons of fat-free skim milk. I thought that would be giving me Vitamin D.

Is it genetics? Because I'm a pale skinned Scottish red head? Or is there possibly something wrong where I'm not absorbing it through nutrition? Being a pale red head, I won't be laying in the sun for hours every day during the summer.

I was gonna say go tanning....lol

Are you anemic, by any chance?

Biggest cause of vit. D deficiency is lack of sun (it is formed when sun hits the skin).. i.e. from staying indoors too much and not exposing much skin.
In the winter time, if it gets cold where you live, you're basically never going to produce significant amounts of vit. D due to the sun.

Did you ask them about it? It might be fairly normal for a physical done in the winter time.

Milk usually has added vit. D, look if yours has it if you buy.

I think everyone should use a daily multivitamin, they all have D3 in them. Another very good and healthy supplement is fish oil (like cod liver oil), it has omega3s and a ton of vit. D (like 250IU per oil capsule). You can also try eating more fatty fish, see wikipedia for a list (100g salmon = 360IU). For comparison, an egg has 20IU.

A quote from wiki:
In the United States (U.S.), the 100% Daily Value used for product labels is 400 IU/day and typical diets provide about 100 IU/day. Although milk is usually fortified, the average daily consumption by most Americans is insufficient in obtaining levels of vitamin D recommended by various medical authorities.

Also it says that 15 to 32 is "mildly defficient", I'm willing to bet that most people in the wintertime have values similar to yours.

Yay another redhead! I'm not alone smile.gif LOL

Watch your cholesterol w/ the eggs everyday plan.

I need the eggs for my vision problems, but I'm watching my cholesterol. Total cholesterol = normal... Bad cholesterol was borderline normal, and good cholesterol was low. No, not anemic.
LDL = 101 mg/dL (sugg. 100 or below)
HDL = 31 mg/dL (sugg. 40 or above)
Total chol = 156 mg/dL (sugg. below 200)

I was going to post this question, which goes along with Radu's post, but internet went down right after posting:
Since it WAS on December 23rd (the second shortest day of the year).... it's dark when I get to the office and dark when I leave... how much/easily does your Vitamin D level fluctuate between summer and winter?
Edit: it appears it does fluctuate - http://www.privatemdlabs.com/news/Vitamin%...36;19241697.php "Larson-Meyer and colleagues are studying vitamin D levels in UW athletes in football, wrestling, track and field, cheerleading, swimming, men's and women's basketball and women's soccer. The vitamin D tests found that about 88 percent of the athletes they studied had sufficient levels in the fall but only 36 percent in the winter."

Members of the general public are probably not as well off as the athletes, according to the researchers.

My wife has osteoporosis, so I'm well aware of Vitamin D, Calcium, supplements, Bone Density, etc... but my concern was trying to find out why my Vit. D was so low, and if it really should be considered "low" in winter when I'm getting zero sun exposure.

Doctor suggested Fish Oil, 1000mg 2x daily

move to australia

that will fix ur problem lol smile.gif

oh and take 3 or 4 fish oil tabs a day
required omega 3 intake is around 1g+ a day....about 300mg are per tab
plus the recent studies indicate that fish oil actually is the bom shiz and prevents a whole heap of sh*t

Sweet, fish oil is great, it should fix you right up smile.gif In fact i'm gonna go take some right now lol