I take a normal daily multivitamin. It contains a
solid 400IU of vitamin D, which is a good solid dose, right
from the USDA. For normal Earthican people. Who
have light skin. And who are getting normal exposure to
sun at normal wavelengths and intensities, for normally long
periods of the year.
Whelps long story short, nearly all of the 600K
people living in Alaska are moderately to seriously deficient
in Vitamin D; and what they need is not 400IU daily (which they're not getting unless they're taking a multivitamin), but something
three or four times that.
My psych-MD (therefore MD) said ohyeah,
it's practically a given
that general blood tests at the doctors' office come back
saying "Vitamin D: very yes too little", which you'd think MDs
might mention to all their new patients even as they walk
in the door for the first time even before there's a need for
blood test for any reason, but, uh, not so much.
She remembers one extreme
case— a patient whose general blood report incidentally
said: "vitamin D: undetectable". I.e., there
was presumably some in there, but that it was below the
presumably tiny threshold that the blood-mo-stat could
detect. That means they could get RICKETS. Haven't
heard that word in a while, have you? Well...
* * *
So I'm off to go get to buy some 1000IU pills, and take
them daily, on top of my normal multivitamin,
daily.
* * *
By the way, anyone living at or north of Boston (or, on the other
coast, Portand and north of)— the above applies to you too for at least November, December, January, and February.
Of course, doses change significantly for infants,
pregnant women, and nursing mothers.
2008-05-02 (Friday)