Vitamin Information Center

Vitamin D, which the body makes when exposed to sunlight, may help prevent multiple sclerosis (MS), suggests a new study.

What’s more, the principal regulator of calcium in the body may also prevent the production of malignant cells such as breast and prostate cancer cells.

According to an article by Sylvia Christakos, PhD, of the UMDNJ-New Jersey Medical School, the research shows that the incidence of MS decreases as the amount of vitamin D available to the body increases, either through sunlight exposure or diet.

The study has been published online in the Journal of Cellular Biochemistry.

“Since vitamin D is produced in the skin through solar or UV irradiation and high serum levels have been shown to correlate with a reduced risk of MS, this suggests that vitamin D may regulate the immune response and may promote a host’s reaction to a pathogen,” Christakos said.

Christakos’ report focuses on the immunosuppressive actions of the active form of vitamin D, which may inhibit the induction of MS, and emphasizes the importance of maintaining a sufficient vitamin D level.

“Evidence has shown that the maintenance of an adequate vitamin D level may have a protective effect in individuals predisposed to MS,” Christakos said.

“One device of vitamin D action may be to preserve balance in the T-cell reaction and thus avoid autoimmunity,” Christakos added.

Despite the significant evidence of the benefits of vitamin D relative to MS and other autoimmune diseases, Christakos cautions that further studies are needed to determine whether vitamin D alone or combined with other treatments is effective in individuals with active MS.

Having too little vitamin D in the body might raise the risk of premature death, a study by Johns Hopkins researchers shows.

It follows other recent studies showing that low amounts of vitamin D are linked to certain cancers, diabetes, and bone and immune system problems, but this is the first research to connect vitamin D deficiency to a higher risk of death, said the study’s co- author Erin Michos, an assistant professor of cardiology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore.

The study appears in this week’s Archives of Internal Medicine.

Michos and her colleagues analyzed data from a large government observational survey of more than 13,000 people who represented a realistic, diverse swath of U.S. adults ages 20 or older. Participants’ vitamin D amounts were determined through blood tests from 1988 through 1994.

By 2000, Michos said, 1,807 deaths had occurred, including 777 from cardiovascular disease.

The researchers divided the total population into four groups based on their amounts of vitamin D. One group included people with the least vitamin D, 17.8 ng/mL (nanograms/milliliter) or less.

A normal vitamin D test result for both children and adults is 30 ng/mL or more. Less than 20 ng/mL is considered deficient, and results between 20 and 30 ng/mL are labeled insufficient, said Catherine Gordon, director of the bone health program at Children’s Hospital Boston.

In the study, Michos said, people who had low vitamin D — 17.8 ng/mL or less — were 26 percent more likely to be dead at the end of the study than those with more.

Michos now suspects that low vitamin D is related to heart disease deaths, but that theory has to be tested in further studies, she said.

Originally published by USA TODAY.

(c) 2008 Tulsa World. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.

Source: Tulsa World

CHRONIC pain in women may be related to low levels of vitamin D, the nutrient made by the skin when exposed to sunlight.

Researchers who studied nearly 7000 British 45-year-olds found that almost 15 per cent of women with the lowest levels of the vitamin reported experiencing chronic pain - nearly twice the 8.2 per cent prevalence reported among women with higher readings.

However, vitamin D levels appeared to make no difference to the number of men who reported pain symptoms - leaving the study’s authors perplexed as to whether lack of vitamin D in women was the cause.

The authors noted that a disease caused by extreme vitamin D deficiency, osteomalacia, was known to cause bone pain.

The research concluded that further studies were required to establish whether pain would be lessened if patients increased their vitamin D intake.

For the study, published yesterday in the journal Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases, the authors included medical data from 6824 Britons who were examined between 2002 and 2004, when they were aged 45. Information was collected on their smoking and alcohol habits, time spent outdoors, time spent watching television or at a computer and dietary supplements, including vitamin D.

Samples of their blood werealso analysed for

levels of 25-hydroxy-vitaminD (25(OH)D), which is a metabolised form of the vitamin and a marker for vitamin D levels.

The lowest prevalence of chronic widespread pain (8.2per cent) was reported in women with 75 to 99 nanomoles of 25(OH)D per litre of blood.

The rate was 14.4 per cent for women with less than 25nmol/l, and 14.8per cent for women with 25-49nmol/l.

John Eisman, director of the bone and mineral research program at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research, said the study was interesting but by its design could not “unravel” whether lower vitamin D was causing the pain, or vice-versa.

Professor Eisman, who is also an endocrinologist at Sydney’s St Vincent’s Hospital, agreed that more studies were required.

In the meantime, if doctors were faced with patients battling chronic pain, “it might be worth giving them vitamin D, to see if it makes a difference”, he said.

Ghrelin regulates hunger pangs

High levels of the “hunger hormone” ghrelin have an antidepressant effect, US researchers claim.

Blocking the body’s response to ghrelin has been suggested as a weight loss treatment but it may also produce unintended effects on mood, they said.

The Nature Neuroscience study found mice with increased levels of the hormone showed fewer signs of depression and anxiety.

Experts said the idea was interesting but further studies were needed.

Ghrelin is released by the empty stomach into the bloodstream before moving to the brain, where it triggers feelings of hunger.

Treatment with the hormone itself - or a drug designed to cancel its effects - might be able to help both people who are eating too little, such as cancer patients, or those who eat too much, researchers believe.

In the latest study, Dr Jeffrey Zigman and colleagues restricted the food intake of laboratory mice for 10 days, causing their ghrelin levels to quadruple.

Compared with mice who had free access to food, the calorie-restricted mice showed lower levels of depression and anxiety when subjected to mazes and other behaviour tests.

Hormone response

The team also looked at mice genetically engineered to be unable to respond to ghrelin.

When they were fed a restricted-calorie diet they did not experience the antidepressant or anti-anxiety effects.

The researchers found the same thing when they induced higher ghrelin levels by subjecting the mice to stress.

Those mice that could not respond to ghrelin had greater levels of depression-like symptoms than the normal mice.

“Our findings in mice suggest that chronic stress causes ghrelin levels to go up, and that behaviours associated with depression and anxiety decrease when ghrelin levels rise,” said Dr Zigman, a researcher at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.

“An unfortunate side effect, however, is increased food intake and body weight,” he added.

He said the results made sense from an evolutionary standpoint, as hunter-gatherers may have had a survival advantage in remaining calm and collected in times of hunger in order for them to successfully find food.

The researchers are now hoping to look at the antidepressant effect of the hormone in conditions such as anorexia.

Professor Stephen Bloom, an expert in appetite regulation at Imperial College London, said it was reasonable to believe that ghrelin had an impact on behavioural responses other than just hunger.

But he said there was a lot of research to be done before it could be confirmed that a hormone released in the stomach can have an effect on mood in the brain.

“The role of ghrelin in the gut and in the brain are likely to be completely different,” he said.

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