Vitamin D and bloodwork

Gittit Shwartz · 11-14-2008, 05:57 AM

I had some odd results on blood tests recently and was wondering if any of you had an idea what was going on.

In June my tests showed I was deficient in vitamin D (22 ng/mL, "sufficiency" being 32-100 ng/mL). Since then I've been taking 3 tsp. of CLO every day (Nordic Naturals, at 1000 IU per tsp). I tested again last week and got the exact same result - 22 ng/mL.

...?!

Maybe I should just make sure to get more sunlight... But I would still like to know why my CLO isn't doing its job!

Thanks in advance.

Kris Reeves · 11-14-2008, 06:10 AM

From what I've read...unless you live in southern Florida a more realistic dose of vitamin D3 is in the 4,000-6,000 IU's a day range.

This site has some articles that may interest you:
http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/

I'm currently taking 6,000 IU's a day since I'm indoors a lot due to work. And when I'm outside it's usually when the sun is not at it's peak. As well, it seems to always be cloudy when I'm doing yard work, etc.

Considering the human body can make something like 20,000 IU's with just 30 minutes of full sun exposure (think laying on the beach)...I'm not worried about toxicity.

Gittit Shwartz · 11-14-2008, 07:33 AM

I'm not worried about vitamin D toxicity from CLO, it's the vit. A that may be a problem.
Kris, do you take vit. D alone? To get that much from CLO you would have to drink the stuff by the bottle... The doc who had me take those tests prescribed some kind of synthetic vitamin D drops, but I didn't take them.

Kris Reeves · 11-14-2008, 08:33 AM

Gittit -

I take the Vitamin D3 by itself (they're tic-tac sized pills) and I take 2 pills three times a day.

Yeah, I wouldn't want to drink a whole bottle of CLO!!

Just checking the supplement facts on Nordic Naturals, there's only apparently 20 IU's a day per teaspoon. Combine that with the info from vitamindcouncil.org it sounds like that's not enough to make a difference.

If you decide to supplement with extra Vitamin D, make sure it's Vitamin D3.

Gittit Shwartz · 11-14-2008, 08:48 AM

Kris, thanks for the info. I actually used "Arctic-D" CLO which has extra D in it, though I have since switched to Green Pastures.

Garrett Smith · 11-14-2008, 08:55 AM

From what I can remember, Nordic Naturals CLO is not very high in D at all.

When Vitamin A and D come together in a natural form like cod liver oil, there is little worry of toxicity. I keep trying to find any evidence of toxicity from high doses of CLO and no one ever presents any--they always present toxicity cases from either high-dose synthetic vitamin A *OR* high-dose vitamin D. Never CLO or the two vitamins together.

What type of vitamin D test was it? There are several out there and not all of them are as useful as they could be.

Here's a big review on "safety" of Vitamin A, where the A + D factor is addressed briefly, as well as levels of toxicity in both chronic and acute doses. There is also a brief mention that oil-based forms of vit. A do not raise plasma levels as high or as quickly as water-based forms, another layer of the CLO debate.

Gittit Shwartz · 11-14-2008, 10:05 AM

The results sheet says

"Vitamin D 25 (OH)

Result: 22 ng/mL

Reference Ranges:
Deficiency: <10 ng/mL
Hypovitaminosis: 10-32 ng/mL
Sufficiency: 32-100 ng/mL
Toxicity: >100 ng/mL"

I was definitely taking 3000 IU/day according to the label on the bottle. It was CLO with added vitamin D though - so I don't know how much of that amount was naturally occurring in the oil, if that matters.

Garrett Smith · 11-14-2008, 10:50 AM

How much sunlight on exposed, non-sunscreened skin are you getting?

Very little of the D in that CLO was naturally-occurring. It seems that certain purification processes tend to yank out a lot of the vitamin D with the other "toxic" things.

I recently had this happen (low D even with supplementing CLO) with another patient who was taking 2000iu per day.

Gittit Shwartz · 11-15-2008, 07:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Garrett Smith

How much sunlight on exposed, non-sunscreened skin are you getting?

Very little of the D in that CLO was naturally-occurring. It seems that certain purification processes tend to yank out a lot of the vitamin D with the other "toxic" things.

I recently had this happen (low D even with supplementing CLO) with another patient who was taking 2000iu per day.

I haven't been getting much sunlight lately, except for a couple hours on weekends. I guess I should start paying attention to that. I know I feel better when I soak up some sun daily.

It's starting to look like winter here though, so I hope Green Pastures does a better job.

Thanks for the replies, all!