Vitamin D deficiency increases risk of losing muscle strength by 78%:
Vitamin D plays an important role in the regulation of calcium and phosphorus absorption by the organism. It also helps keep the brain and immune system working. Researchers at the Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar) in Brazil and University College London (UCL) in the United Kingdom have now shown that vitamin D supplementation reduces the risk of dynapenia in older people by 78%.
Dynapenia is an age-associated loss of muscle strength. It can be partially explained by muscle atrophy and is a major risk factor for physical incapacity later in life. People with dynapenia are more likely to fall, need to go to hospital, be prematurely institutionalized, and die.
[...] "Vitamin D is known to participate in various functions of the organism. Actually, it's a hormone and its many roles include helping to repair muscles and releasing calcium for muscle contraction kinetics. It was therefore expected to cause muscle alterations of some kind. That's exactly what our study proved," said Tiago da Silva Alexandre, last author of the article. Alexandre is a professor of gerontology at UFSCar.
Bone and muscle tissue are interconnected not just mechanically and physically but also biochemically. "Endocrine disorders such as vitamin D deficiency or insufficiency can lead to loss of bone mineral density as well as a reduction in muscle mass, strength and function," he said.
[...] Our body only synthesizes vitamin D when large areas of skin are exposed to sunlight, Alexandre recalled. "It's necessary to explain to people that they risk losing muscle strength if they don't get enough vitamin D. They need to expose themselves to the sun, eat food rich in vitamin D or take a supplement, and do resistance training exercises to maintain muscle strength," he said.
Journal Reference:
Delinocente, M.L.B., Luiz, M.M., de Oliveira, D.C. et al. Are Serum 25-Hydroxyvitamin D Deficiency and Insufficiency Risk Factors for the Incidence of Dynapenia?. Calcif Tissue Int 111, 571–579 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00223-022-01021-8
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by Barenflimski on Wednesday February 08, @07:00PM (7 children)
I love the sun.
Does sunscreen affect Vitamin D creation? The only studies I found mentioned that for the sunscreens of the pre 1990's, the answer was, "likely not to have an effect." They then mention, "But no one has tested these super high modern day sunscreens. They mention that darker skinned folks need more sun than lighter skinned folks to create the same levels of vitamin D. So maybe?
Either way, it does feel good to get outside.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by RS3 on Wednesday February 08, @07:19PM (4 children)
Same here, real sun just makes me feel better. Like everything, there is no "one size fits all" (yet everyone keeps seeking that holy grail!). Some people bake themselves into older-age leather and don't seem to get melanoma. Some get melanoma with almost no sun exposure. I have to wonder if a little sun is better than none because the vit. D helps boost immune system that should try to stop malignancies.
Here's some information about UVA, UVB, UVC. [healthline.com]
Sunscreens hopefully block UVB and C (bad for you) and allow some UVA, depending on the SPF (Sun Protection Factor) rating.
It's nice out- time to go get some sun.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Mykl on Wednesday February 08, @09:04PM (3 children)
This is a real challenge in Australia, where we are basically told to cover up and sunscreen all the time. The sun is definitely stronger here (when visiting the US, I walked around for hours with no problem in conditions that would have me burned in 30 minutes in Australia).
I'll be out there later today planting something (NB: It's high summer in the Southern Hemisphere), so will need to work out if I am going to be more than 10-15 minutes and will therefore need to sunscreen first.
(Score: 3, Informative) by GloomMower on Wednesday February 08, @09:37PM
The U.S. is big, there are places that are like that as well (west), as well as places that are not (east). Looking at maps the difference can be over double. The worst places in the U.S. seem comparable to Australia though (according to data I've seen).
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday February 09, @06:03PM (1 child)
The highest temperature ever recorded on Earth was in Death Valley. That's in the southwestern US. Plus, in central Illinois it can be a balmy 80 F one day, and 105 the next. A single visit to any country won't tell you jack about its climate,
My experience was August 1973 to August 1974 at Utapao AFB in Thailand. I thought it damned hot and dry. Then in April the skies opened and it poured until I left in August. If I'd only spent a month there I would have been clueless.
Carbon, The only element in the known universe to ever gain sentience
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Thursday February 09, @10:55PM
That's nice. Doesn't say anything about the UV levels though.
It doesn't matter that the US is the winner for "highest temperature ever recorded" (congratulations by the way). Your UV levels are lower than southern Australia, where I live (close to the hole in the Ozone layer over Antarctica). That is what results in greater risk of sunburn in Aus vs US, not the temperature.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday February 08, @07:28PM
Important point about darker-skinned folks needing more sun, but there's a point [nih.gov] past which vitamin_d_generated(skin tone, diet, latitude, which hours of sun exposure during the day, which season) produces insufficient Vitamin D that fortification in foods or pill-based supplementation is needed.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday February 09, @05:52PM
I love the sun, but allow its rays to hit me directly as little as possible. Sunlight doesn't just let your body make the same vitamin D you can get in a pill or your coffee creamer (although you can overdose on artificial D). The sun makes you old and wrinkled and gives you skin cancer.
People can't believe I'm 70 and ask what my secret is. I tell them I chose my grandparents wisely (Uncle Joe made it to 103 and my mom said he looked like he was in his 70s in his 90s. She died of a treatable cigarette cancer in 2020 at age 92, 40 years after quitting, when nobody went to the doctor and she could no longer go bowling twice a week or to the gym. You didn't have to catch Covid for it to kill you), and DNA is the main reason, but staying out of the sun and drinking a lot of water has at least a little to do with my relatively youthful looks.
My problem isn't muscle atrophy, despite staying out of the sun and not getting much exercise at all, my problem is I get winded easily. Shouldn't have smoked all those expensive damned cigarettes for three decades. But last year I bought an ebike, and it was Christmas before I started getting out of breath easily again.
Carbon, The only element in the known universe to ever gain sentience
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday February 08, @08:35PM (5 children)
A few years ago some articles came out about research saying that as we age, to stay healthy and ward off dynapenia, sarcopenia, atrophy, and other age-related issues, researchers found the important supplements are:
fish oil,
vitamin D,
whey protein,
and creatine [mayoclinic.org].
I searched on those keywords but as usual you get too many results, paywalled articles, etc. Here's one lonnnng result [frontiersin.org].
No one size fits all, but it's a good general start.
Of course, exercise is super important too. Get up and move around. (I guess I need to take my own advice...)
(Score: 3, Informative) by inertnet on Thursday February 09, @07:05AM (1 child)
You might want to take a look at NMN as well.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Thursday February 09, @07:38AM
Yeah, thank you. Had to ask the Internets about it and they're telling me it's banned in the US by FDA. But they listed a bunch of foods that have it:
edamame [wikipedia.org],
broccoli,
cabbage,
cucumber,
avocado
I'm buying them tomorrow!
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 09, @07:09AM (2 children)
Regarding fish oil - I've busted open fish oil capsules from different sources and some smelled bad whereas others smelled like fresh fish oil would (slight fishiness but not very fishy).
Rancid/rotten fish oil is still technically fish oil but I doubt it is as good for your health as fresh fish oil. Might even be harmful.
So it does make me wonder about those studies where some say fish oil works and others say fish oil doesn't work. Are they also testing the oil to see whether the oil is fresh?
After all eating fresh fish may be good for your health while I suspect consuming rotten fish won't be as good... 😉
See also: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jan/17/revealed-many-common-omega-3-fish-oil-supplements-are-rancid [theguardian.com]
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Thursday February 09, @08:33AM (1 child)
A Dr. I visited 15 or so years ago was very big on fish oil, and sold "Res-Q". It was supposed to be very carefully harvested, handled, processed, etc., and from Norway.
I have a generic branded bottle I was taking 3 years ago. It smelled kind of normal, as fish goes. At some point I started getting sick such that I couldn't eat anything. If I did it would go through me very fast, accompanied by fever. Needless to say I stopped the fish oil too. All I could eat was small hard candies for a month. I lost 20-25 lbs (9-11.3 kg) (1.42-1.78 stone). Things got back to normal, but I've never taken those fish oil pills. I haven't opened one. They don't stink, but I had a gut feel (I had to) that the pills were somehow contaminated or something, but no clue where / how to get them tested. I need to buy a mass spectrometer. (that would be cool actually).
Shortly after that month of not eating I went to a Dr. for a skin infection (no clue what / why / how) and found I also had Lyme disease, but also very high (bad) liver numbers. I had no other symptoms. The Dr. gave me a script for a liver CT. She suspected bile duct strictures, but I didn't have full insurance at the time.
I got a blood retest 6 or so months later and liver numbers had come down to high normal. Maybe I had hepatitis? Maybe came from the fish oil pills? It was a couple of years before I started taking fish oil again.
Lady I knew who lived to 101 wasn't big on fish oil pills- she liked fish, but didn't trust the processing into pills. She took flax oil and other omega supplements.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 10, @01:33AM
Unfortunately flaxseed oil isn't as good: https://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/why-not-flaxseed-oil [harvard.edu]
As for your sickness it might have been coincidental - the fish oil might not have been the cause.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Wednesday February 08, @11:59PM (5 children)
I'm at 65N latitude. We don't get much sunlight here.
When I moved here a few years back, nobody warned me about vitamin D deficiency. I found out the hard way: for a few months, I was completely exhausted. And then I started feeling like I was dying. Literally. I've never felt that in my entire life.
Eventually I went see the doctor to tell her I was dying - because that's exactly how I felt. One quick blood test revealed that my vitamin D levels were at rock bottom. The good doctor reminded me that "you foreigners need to take your pills", and higher dosed ones too because I wasn't of Scandinavian decent (apparently I'm genetically at a disadvantage here with regards to vitamin D). After a few days taking supplements, I stopped dying :)
So yeah, it's important. Even if you live further down south, if you don't go out much, don't overlook vitamin D if you're feeling depressed or physically spent.
(Score: 4, Informative) by bobthecimmerian on Thursday February 09, @02:50AM (4 children)
In order to get Vitamin D from sunshine, which is the best way to get it, we should be outside near midday. I don't know how anyone with an office job can manage that often enough to matter. I have to take a ludicrous amount of Vitamin D supplements to keep my levels healthy for most of the year.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 09, @07:12AM
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday February 09, @06:08PM (2 children)
Since sunlight exposure causes skin cancer; half the guys I know have had it, I'll stay the hell out of the sun, thank you. I can take a pill.
Carbon, The only element in the known universe to ever gain sentience
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Friday February 10, @07:17PM (1 child)
Most of the people I know with skin cancer spent a huge amount of time outside, like my neighbor that did roofing for forty years and got badly sunburned every year. Or my friend that died of skin cancer, who was a long distance runner for decades and had a heart of steel and skin of burnt leather.
So I'm not convinced 15 minutes in midday sun per day (which is enough for a light-skinned person - closer to 45 is needed for people with darker skin) is high risk. Insufficient vitamin D has all kinds of serious health risks all of its own, including weakened immune system. So maybe someone in their 50s with a chronic vitamin D deficiency dies of the flu - nobody puts "lack of vitamin D" on the death certificate.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Saturday February 11, @03:24PM
Yes, my dad was an electrical lineman, but a lot of folks I know didn't work outside. One fellow was a car mechanic, had several skin cancers removed. Of course, the sun isn't the only thing that can cause skin cancer, but when the cancers are all on the face and neck, the sun is the #1 suspect.
Carbon, The only element in the known universe to ever gain sentience
(Score: 1, Troll) by nostyle on Thursday February 09, @06:13AM (4 children)
I did not read TFA, but ...
If our sample size is 1000, and administering Vitamin D to folks reduces the number experiencing muscle loss from 9 to 5, then we have an 80% reduction in the risk of muscle loss.
This does not mean that all 1000 of them would benefit from such supplementation, although drugstore would love it if you subscribed.
Just sayin'.
--
"I've been drinkin' coffee, and I've been eatin' healthy" -Ariana Grande, 34+35
(Score: 5, Informative) by nostyle on Thursday February 09, @07:29AM (1 child)
For grins I went back and read the article. Here is the paydirt...
...so the change in incidence is 13.1 -> 20.2 -> 27.4 per 1000. Then about 14 people out of a thousand might benefit from this treatment.
--
"Doctor, doctor, gimme the news", Robert Palmer, Bad Case of Loving You
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 09, @03:39PM
Better headlline:
"Ninety-nine percent of seniors see no benefit in vitamin D supplementation when it comes to dynapenia"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 10, @05:45AM (1 child)
Excerpted from this journal post [soylentnews.org].
I surely did not intend any "troll" nor any "flamebait" here. Hey, take all the vitamin D you please. Just don't be surprised if it's a waste of money.
-nostyle
--
"Gonna get inside you - Gonna get inside your bitter mind" -Pete Townshend, Rough Boys
(Score: 2) by ChrisMaple on Sunday February 12, @06:53AM
Vitamin D is one of the least expensive supplements available, and its benefits extend far beyond helping to preserve muscle. If you are interested, you can get your blood level of vitamin D tested and compared to the optimum range.