[HN Gopher] Vitamin D supplementation and incident dementia
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Vitamin D supplementation and incident dementia
Author : bookofjoe
Score : 46 points
Date : 2023-03-03 17:51 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com)
| underdeserver wrote:
| I dove deep into Vitamin D supplementation research during Covid.
| The tl;dr as I understand it - and bear in mind I'm a layperson
| in this - is that while Vitamin D deficiency correlates to many
| bad things, taking Vitamin D doesn't help _. It does raise your
| level as it shows up in blood tests, but the bad things still
| happen.
|
| _ Except for some very specific issues.
|
| I have a mild deficiency and used to take Vitamin D. I stopped
| taking it after consulting with a doctor on the meaning of the
| VITAL study results [1]. I also recommend [2], from a practicing
| surgeon who deals with Vitamin D related medical issues in
| patients.
|
| [1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35939577/ [2]
| https://www.devaboone.com/post/vitamin-d-part-3-the-evidence
| steelframe wrote:
| Thank you for this. I've heard that it's not so much the
| Vitamin D itself that may be beneficial, but rather the process
| whereby Vitamin D gets produced that results in the benefits.
|
| The tapestry of cells in our bodies has evolved over millions
| of years to function in a way that is most favorable to
| propagating themselves in the context of the environment in
| which they underwent natural selection. It seems we've removed
| ourselves from that environment in a lot of ways and then have
| been trying to compensate for that by micro-managing telemetry
| that we're able to easily or cheaply observe. However the
| underlying complexity is far, far beyond what we see as the end
| result of the cellular processes.
| waboremo wrote:
| >while Vitamin D deficiency correlates to many bad things,
| taking Vitamin D doesn't help.
|
| Your links state the exact opposite and it's important to get
| wording right here. If you have a tested vitamin D deficiency
| (and it's not "mild", as Deva Boone highlights), there are
| CLEAR benefits to supplementing.
|
| It's only in _healthy_ individuals where the benefits are tiny
| (like the cancer testing 0.9% v 1.2%) or non-existent.
| red-iron-pine wrote:
| This is a very neutral headline. But for the tl;dr crowd:
|
| > Across all formulations, vitamin D exposure was associated with
| significantly longer dementia-free survival and lower dementia
| incidence rate than no exposure (hazard ratio = 0.60, 95%
| confidence interval: 0.55-0.65). The effect of vitamin D on
| incidence rate differed significantly across the strata of sex,
| cognitive status, and APOE e4 status.
| TedDoesntTalk wrote:
| You can get your APOE e4 status, which is a marker for
| Alzheimer's and dementia, from any DNA test like 23AndMe. To
| protect your privacy: use a fake name, new email address, and
| get a temporary UPS Store mailbox address for the kit to be
| mailed to. Use a Visa gift card for payment. Yes, it can be
| done and it works.
| floxy wrote:
| >To protect your privacy...
|
| You can't really expect too much privacy with a DNA type
| test, right? Since it knows all of your relatives who have
| also taken the test.
| netfortius wrote:
| I've been taking 1000 IUs daily, for the last 20 years, skipping
| summers (during which I would attempt sun exposure), while
| continuously being within acceptable medians for my age. I sure
| hope what I am typing now makes sense :-)
| cypherpunks01 wrote:
| Any chance you have an identical twin who has not?
| fshbbdssbbgdd wrote:
| Like all studies into Vitamin D supplementation that aren't
| randomized controlled trials, it's very hard to tell apart cause
| and effect. Vitamin D naturally occurs when people go outside and
| get exposed to the sun, and going outside is correlated with all
| sorts of healthy traits. Also, publicity of the association of
| vitamin D with good health has led people who care about their
| health or who have access to good medical care to supplement
| vitamin D. Studies that look at the health of people who choose
| to supplement vitamin D are examining the overall health of those
| people and can't specifically measure the effects of the vitamin
| D supplementation. That's one of the problems randomized
| controlled trials are designed to solve.
|
| The study mentions these limitations:
|
| > Considering that sun exposure is the most important natural
| source of vitamin D, the lack of information on participant-level
| exposure to sunlight can be considered another limitation of the
| present study.
|
| > While we included education in our models, the NACC dataset has
| a dearth of information related to SES and therefore, SES
| differences could not be accounted for in our study. Future
| studies using cohorts with more comprehensive data on SES and
| other social factors would certainly provide valuable information
| on the associations of SES with exposure to supplementation and
| risk of dementia.
|
| For what it's worth, controlling for a variable like education
| can only partially remove related bias from a result (you don't
| have a perfect measure of how a person decided to take vitamin
| D).
| rogers18445 wrote:
| When evolution molds a genepool it does so with inbuilt
| assumptions, one the assumptions is exposure to some level of
| sunlight. Deviating from these assumptions would result in
| undefined behavior (in the CS sense) for individuals.
|
| If an individual cannot or will not expose themselves to
| sunlight, taking D3 is probably the best option they have.
| fshbbdssbbgdd wrote:
| In my opinion, these are the best options if you want to be
| healthy like people who get sun exposure (in order from most
| to least likely to work):
|
| 1. Act like a person who is exposed to sunlight.
|
| 2. Expose yourself to sunlight.
|
| 3. Supplement vitamin D.
| CharlesW wrote:
| Hey people who follow the science: As an "indoor human", how much
| should I be taking? (TIA!)
| sanman811 wrote:
| I wouldn't say I have followed the science but my doc
| prescribed 2000 IUs daily and it definitely makes a noticeable
| difference in a gloomy winter
| greenyoda wrote:
| What kind of a difference have you noticed? I also take 2000
| IUs, but I haven't noticed any significant difference in how
| I feel since I've started taking it.
| nicoburns wrote:
| How are feeling generally? It's possible you didn't have a
| deficiency to start with. I went from being completely
| depressed, barely able to get out of bed to mostly
| functional (although still not quite as chirpy as I am in
| summer) when I started taking a vit d supplement in winter.
| torial wrote:
| you might want to check on your Vitamin D receptivity. For
| example, I took a DNA test, and it indicated my Vitamin D
| receptors weren't as efficient as normal so I should take
| higher doses than other people.
| jacobriis wrote:
| Up to 4,000 IU is generally recognized as safe. If you take a
| multivitamin, there is some in that that you should subtract.
|
| https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/how-much-vita...
| beardface wrote:
| I would advise taking a K2 MK7 supplement with D3, or get a
| supplement that contains both. Personally, I take one capsule a
| day that contains both 3000IU of D3 and 100mg of K2 MK7.
|
| D3 by itself can cause high calcium levels, to the point of
| toxicity in very high doses. The K2 moves the calcium from the
| blood to bones.
| TedDoesntTalk wrote:
| I take LifeExtension K2 MK7. It's quite inexpensive and
| LifeExtension is reputable brand.
| gumby wrote:
| > Personally, I take one capsule a day that contains both
| 3000IU of D3
|
| Not sure how much D3 you're getting (though starting with 3K
| IU is a lot) because it's not clear how much gets through the
| gut. You might want to take some cod liver oil (O3 capsules)
| at the same time -- the fat is believed to improve the still
| mysterious absorption process.
|
| Typical dosage is a drop of cholecalciferol suspension under
| the tongue for direct absorption.
| underdeserver wrote:
| Talk to your doctor. Probably nothing. See my root-level
| comment.
| pazimzadeh wrote:
| First get tested to see how deficient you are. I was prescribed
| 50,000 IU a week for 8 weeks because I have 12 ng/mL. Standard
| range is 30 to 80 ng/mL.
| GoToRO wrote:
| Not science person but I took some and I was too sleepy, all
| day. Also there are about 4-5 hours until it promotes the
| production of melatonin and so you have to time it right. Also
| it is fat soluble, you need to take it with your (fat?) meal.
| patrulek wrote:
| Something between 2k-10k should be fine.
| troydavis wrote:
| Test your current level, ideally in the winter or early spring.
| If it's low or low-normal[1], start with 2000 IU/day. Wait 6-9
| months, test again. If it's still low, increase to 4000 IU/day.
|
| The comments on this submission have more:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34634977#34635562
|
| [1] If it's really low, see a doctor
| sebow wrote:
| Some might not like this answer but the best course of action
| is still some sun exposure. As for the actual answer, someone
| correct me if I'm wrong but there there are multiple 'variants'
| of vit. D and the vast majority of "vit D" supplements most
| likely don't include the complete formula (which is arguably
| the best way in order to also assimilate it "fully"). The daily
| recommended dose is fine unless you're deficient.
| poxrud wrote:
| There are places where it is impossible to get the
| recommended amount of sun exposure, even if you were to spend
| most of your day outside.
| voldacar wrote:
| If you are truly an indoor human, start with 10k iu daily and
| possibly titrate up from there based on bloodwork. Absorption
| can differ significantly between individuals
| mistrial9 wrote:
| test first, supplement with test results
| spacephysics wrote:
| I'll try to get 15-30 min of sun exposure without sun screen in
| the warmer months each day. Feel immensely better during then, to
| a point where I've seriously considered moving somewhere warmer
| without real winter months.
| encryptluks2 wrote:
| [dead]
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