THE AMAZING VITAMIN D...JUST THE FACTS

The Amazing Vitamin D3…Just the Facts
Robert G. Carlson, MD, FACS

video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQbVTEesb3I


Review of article recently published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, June 2007:


Vitamin D and Calcium supplementation reduces cancer risk: results of a randomized trial. Lappe JM, Travers-Gustafson D, Davies KM, Recker RR, Heaney RP Am J Clin Nutr. 2007 Jun;85(6):1586-91


This was a 4 year, population based, double blinded, randomized, placebo controlled trial.(an extremely well designed study) .This trial looked at healthy women greater than 55 years old in the Midwest. The studies primary goal was to demonstrate the benefit of vitamin D, at a higher dose than recommended (1000 iu versus 400 iu) and calcium in improving bone density. The improvement in bone density was clearly demonstrated. The secondary part of this study, and I believe represents the most crucial findings, examines the beneficial effect of vitamin D and Calcium in reducing all cancers. Again a much higher dose of vitamin D was used in comparison to other studies which used a much lower, disturbingly recommended dietary amount of 400 IU.

This is a very nicely designed clear and concise study which makes the findings even more powerful. This study had three different groups. One group had the calcium and the Vitamin D at 1100 IU. The second group had calcium alone, and the third group was a placebo, or sugar pill. The women in the community were randomly chosen to go into each group. The study was a prospective trial which means it went from day1 to day four years. Now this study was also a double-blinded randomized placebo trial, which means that neither the doctor nor the patient knew what they were taking. They did this by making all of the pills the same color and therefore no one knew what they were taking. This trial went on for four years, and at that time they stopped the study and opened all the envelopes to see who was in which group. That’s when it really gets good. The women in the Vitamin D and Calcium group had an approximately 60 % reduction in ALL cancers. Colon cancers, breast cancers, lung cancers, lymphomas and leukemias. That is quite impressive, however they looked at the results even more carefully. If they removed the first year cancers, which probably represent patients who were already developing cancer when they started taking Vitamin D , and look only at cancer rates in years 2,3,and 4, they found a 75 % reduction in all cancers. Pretty impressive results. Then how come you never heard about it? Why weren't they having Superbowl commercials about vitamin D3? The problem is that for a one month therapy of vitamin D3 it would cost approximately $1.35. Yes that's it. It's not that it is cheap, because it isn't, it's just very inexpensive. But it reduces cancer by 75%

Even though it looks at the age group specifically, I believe that all ladies and men would benefit from the cancer-protecting effects of Vitamin D3 or cholecalciferol. What's the difference between Vitamin D3 and "normal" vitamin D?,.

Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D and colon cancer: eight-year prospective study.
Garland CF, Comstock GW, Garland FC, Helsing KJ, Shaw EK, Gorham ED.
Department of Community and Family Medicine, School of Medicine, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla.
Risk of colon cancer was reduced by 75% in the third quintile (27-32 ng/ml) and by 80% in the fourth quintile (33-41 ng/ml) of serum 25-OHD. Risk of getting colon cancer decreased three-fold in people with a serum 25-OHD concentration of 20 ng/ml or more. The results are consistent with a protective effect of serum 25-OHD on colon cancer.
Lancet. 1989 Nov 18;2(8673):1176-8. Links
Intakes of calcium and vitamin D and breast cancer risk in women.
Lin J, Manson JE, Lee IM, Cook NR, Buring JE, Zhang SM.
Division of Preventive Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02215, USA. jhlin@rics.bwh.harvard.edu
BACKGROUND: Animal data suggest the potential anticarcinogenic effects of calcium and vitamin D on breast cancer development. However, epidemiologic data relating calcium and vitamin D levels to breast cancer have been inconclusive. METHODS: We prospectively evaluated total calcium and vitamin D intake in relation to breast cancer incidence among 10,578 premenopausal and 20,909 postmenopausal women 45 years or older who were free of cancer and cardiovascular disease at baseline in the Women's Health Study. Baseline dietary intake was assessed by a food frequency questionnaire. We used Cox proportional hazards regression to estimate hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals. RESULTS: During an average of 10 years of follow-up, 276 premenopausal and 743 postmenopausal women had a confirmed diagnosis of incident invasive breast cancer. Higher intakes of total calcium and vitamin D were moderately associated with a lower risk of premenopausal breast cancer; the hazard ratios in the group with the highest relative to the lowest quintile of intake were 0.61 (95% confidence interval, 0.40-0.92) for calcium (P = .04 for trend) and 0.65 (95% confidence interval, 0.42-1.00) for vitamin D intake (P = .07 for trend). The inverse association with both nutrients was also present for large or poorly differentiated breast tumors among premenopausal women (P< or =.04 for trend). By contrast, intakes of both nutrients were not inversely associated with the risk of breast cancer among postmenopausal women. CONCLUSIONS: Findings from this study suggest that higher intakes of calcium and vitamin D may be associated with a lower risk of developing premenopausal breast cancer. The likely apparent protection in premenopausal women may be more pronounced for more aggressive breast tumors.
PMID: 17533208 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Nutr Cancer. 2007;59(1):54-61. Links
Dietary vitamin D and calcium intake and premenopausal breast cancer risk in a German case-control study.
Abbas S, Linseisen J, Chang-Claude J.
Division of Cancer Epidemiology, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany.
Epidemiological studies and laboratory data suggest that vitamin D may protect against the development of cancer, including breast cancer. Vitamin D supply affects the bioavailability of dietary calcium, which might also have anticarcinogenic effects. However, few studies considered them jointly. We used a population-based case-control study in Germany to examine the independent and joint effects of dietary vitamin D and calcium on premenopausal breast cancer risk. Dietary information was assessed using a validated food frequency questionnaire from 278 premenopausal cases and 666 age-matched controls. Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were estimated using multivariate models adjusting vitamin D models for calcium intake and vice versa. Breast cancer risk was significantly inversely associated with vitamin D intake. The OR and 95% CI for the highest intake category (> or = 5 microg/day) was 0.50 (95% CI = 0.26-0.96) compared with the lowest (< 2 microg/day; P(trend) = 0.02). Dietary calcium intake was not associated with breast cancer (OR = 0.73, 95% CI = 0.41-1.29) for the highest (> or = 1,300 mg/day) versus the lowest category (< 700 mg/day), P(trend) = 0.29). No statistically significant interaction between the 2 nutrients was observed. Our data support a protective effect of dietary vitamin D on premenopausal breast cancer risk independent of dietary calcium intake.
PMID: 17927502 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Improving calcium and vitamin D nutritional status substantially reduces all-cancer risk in postmenopausal women. This trial was registered

The British Medical Journal has published a remarkable paper confirming that low vitamin D levels obtained in the past are a risk factor for developing colon cancer in the future.

But the study contained an even more significant finding, that Vitamin A, even in relatively low amounts, can thwart vitamin D's association with reduced rates of colon cancer.

This is the largest study to date showing vitamin A blocks vitamin D's effect.

Hidden on page eight of the paper was one sentence and a small table, showing that the benefits of vitamin D are almost entirely negated in those with the highest vitamin A (retinol or preformed, not Beta-Carotene) intake.

And the retinol intake did not have to be that high -- only about 3,000 IU/day. Young autistic children often take 3,500 IU of retinol a day in their powdered multivitamins, which doesn't count any additional vitamin A given in high single doses.

The finding explains some of the anomalies in other papers on vitamin D and cancer -- similar studies sometimes have widely different results. This may be because the effect of vitamin A was not taken into account. In some countries, cod liver oil, which contains very large amounts of preformed vitamin A, and now high levels of PCB’s is commonly used as a vitamin D supplement, albeit a lousy supplement because it not only tastes bad, but blocks all the incredible benefits of Vitamin D.

You need to take at least 2000-4000 units of vitamin D each day, and when you feel a cold coming on need to increase this to 10,000 a day for 3 days.