Vitamin D

Tell us what you are using to treat your MS-- and how you are doing.
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SandyK
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Vitamin D

Post by SandyK »

Hi. My 19 year old daughter just had a blood test and it was found that she was severely deficient in vit D. Her doctor put her on 50,000 IU once a week for 16 weeks. I have been doing some research about this high amount and it is both good and bad.

The good is increased energy. The bad is vomiting and loss of appetite. Oh, with the increased energy comes crushing fatigue! There are some other things to look for, of course.

Am I being a paranoid mom or should I talk to her doctor? She is over 18 so I don't know how far I would get.

Thank you.
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NHE
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by NHE »

Hi Sandy,
I know that Jimmylegs has taken very high doses of vitamin D for a short time period in order to get her numbers up to a healthy range. I don't remember what the exact protocol was, i.e., how many IUs and for how long. Perhaps you could search through some of Jimmyleg's posts to see what she did.

NHE
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SandyK
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Post by SandyK »

Thank you. I'll do that.
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jimmylegs
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Post by jimmylegs »

hi there, sounds like NO FUN. i would not expect vomiting, loss of appetite, or fatigue from supplementing vitamin D3. i imagine there is some kind of issue, possibly an imbalance.

some questions:
1) first of all is it D2 she's taking, or D3?
2) pills or liquid?
3) taking all 50,000IU at once, or spread out through the day?
4) taking with food?
5) are the symptoms short term after taking the D3, or do they continue all week?

i have powerful liquid D3.. one drop = 25,000IU. when i megadose i take one drop with breakfast and one with dinner.

50,000IU per day for 10 days was the regimen suggested by my hospital for getting people to boost their level by 50 nmol/L quickly.
when i tried it my level went from the low 70s to 149. perfect.

last time i did a megadose i started at 103 and was aiming for 150 nmol/L.
based on the original response, i took 50,000IU per day for only 8 days. when i got tested my result was 271 nmol/L - 120 points higher than i had meant to go.

271 is also above the known 'safe' serum range for D3. at levels over 250 you can start to see negative effects. i stopped taking any D3 for a while. now i try to take 25,000IU a week but i haven't been really on top of it lately as i'm spending hours in the sun most days.

the difference in response from the first time to the most recent time was that in between, i figured out i was zinc deficient and fixed it. if you're zinc replete your body can handle D3 much better - the first place D3 goes in the body for hydroxylation is the liver. and the liver needs zinc to work properly.

one other thing that happened when i took high levels of D3 was that i did not balance it properly with calcium, magnesium, OR zinc. i ended up with magnesium deficiency, it messed up my throat so much i didn't know when i might suddenly suffocate. a clever pharmacist told me to try magnesium and presto, throat recovery.

the problem had been because i was taking my magnesium only at the same time of day as D3. i had to start taking some mag with my D3, and some at a different time. i like to take magnesium on its own at bedtime. the best form we have heard about so far here at TIMS is magnesium glycinate (albion chelated). the brand i have right now is Carlson.

after all that, the circumstances you describe make me think that possibly, there is an issue with the type of D3 your daughter is taking, or the timing. also, there could be some deficiency related to and linked to the D3 deficiency, that is not being addressed and is possibly being worsened, with side effects, by the D3 megadosing.

that's all for now, hope we can help you work thru your daughter's problems all right sandy!
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dulceemira
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by dulceemira »

Do more research on vitamin D, it's so important for ms!

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22926855
RESULTS:
A total of 2,362 3T brain MRI scans were acquired from 469 subjects. In multivariate analyses, each 10ng/ml higher 25-hydroxyvitamin D level was associated with a 15% lower risk of a new T2 lesion and a 32% lower risk of a gadolinium-enhancing lesion (IRR, 0.68; 95% CI, 0.53-0.87; p = 0.002). Each 10ng/ml higher vitamin D level was associated with lower subsequent disability. Higher vitamin D levels were associated with lower, but not statistically significant, relapse risk. Except for the EDSS model, all associations were stronger when the within-person change in vitamin D level was the predictor.
INTERPRETATION:
Vitamin D levels are inversely associated with MS activity on brain MRI.

keep your daughter's level up to 80-100 ng D3, level who is not considered toxic

http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/86/3/645.long
"Within 15 min of full-body exposure at midday during the summer, white adults can produce vitamin D equivalent to an intake of 250 μg (10 000 IU) (30). In summary, we have shown that serum concentrations of 25(OH)D in the range of 400 nmol/L (160 ng/ml) can be attained without causing hypercalcemia or hypercalcuria, and they do not cause adverse clinical or paraclinical effects. These findings are encouraging for larger-scale clinical trials in MS and in other medical conditions that may respond to vitamin D. The present study provides an objective confirmation that the recent proposal by Hathcock et al is appropriate—ie, a UL of 250 μg/d (10 000 IU/d) for vitamin D intake can be justified."

Personally, I take a high dose d3 and I had only improvements.
THX1138
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by THX1138 »

The way that vitamins and minerals work in your body is interconnected. How well vitamin D works depends on the amount of other vitamins and minerals that are present in your body. The other vitamins and minerals needed to help vitamin D work well are called cofactors.

To get the most benefit from vitamin D, you must have other cofactors in your body. Vitamin D has a number of cofactors; the ones listed below are the most important.
http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/about-vi ... -minerals/
THX1138
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by THX1138 »

Vitamin D, just like all other nutrients, works in harmony with several other nutrients to perform its many functions. Most importantly, vitamin D requires and 'uses up' magnesium to convert from supplements or sun into its active form in the blood. As such, it is a big mistake to simply take large doses of Vitamin D without taking the need for magnesium into consideration. Yet this is exactly what is happening in most cases and it is causing a lot of people to have problems that they believe are due to side effects of Vitamin D- or even worse they believe they are experiencing an overdose. Such a huge number of people have subtle magnesium deficiency that some researchers and doctors are calling magnesium deficiency an epidemic, and anyone with even a mild or 'subclinical' magnesium deficiency will have this deficiency amplified when Vitamin D is taken. This is creating some uncomfortable 'Side Effects of Vitamin D' that are actually symptoms of an induced magnesium deficiency! Some of the magnesium deficiency symptoms being attributed to Vitamin D are:

Headaches
Insomnia
Jitteriness
Muscle Cramps
Anxiety
Heart Palpitations
Constipation

While there are always going to be those who simply can't tolerate taking Vitamin D supplements for one reason or another, the good news is that the vast majority of these problems can be prevented and even reversed by getting clinically significant amounts of magnesium - while you are getting your Vitamin D from pills or from the sun.
http://www.naturalnews.com/029195_magne ... in_D.html#
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Scott1
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by Scott1 »

Hi,

Let's forget the D3 for a second and focus on the vomiting. Many, many things can be wrong. Most tablets have fillers in them and some people have allergies to those. Does she have a history of allergic responses? Is she writhing in agony when she is ill or does she throw it up and get on with the day? What makes you link the Vit D to the vomiting? Has she returned to the doctor to seek his opinion?
The swing between having energy and then fatigue seems odd. What was she like before she took the Vit D? How far apart how are the highs and lows? We are assuming she has MS, is that the case?
You mentioned other tests. What were they and what did they show? A doctor normally won't order a test unless he has a reason. What prompted the test ? Has she been increasingly unwell over recent time?
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ElliotB
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by ElliotB »

I take 20,000 IU per day (10,000 in the morning and 10,000 in the evening) and have not had any issues of any kind. I personally would not take one massive dose a week. Frankly, it just doesn't make sense (to me) as opposed to spreading the amount out over the course of a week. But I am not a doctor and perhaps your doctor knows best. Did you ask the docotr why he/she put her on such a high dose once a week rather than taking it over the course of a week?

Two of my children had borderline low vitamin D levels. After 6 months of 'normal' doses of D3, their D3 levels are in the middle of the normal range.
THX1138
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by THX1138 »

Vitamin D Absorption Problems

Conversely, it's also true that taking Vitamin D may not raise blood levels in those who are magnesium deficient. In many cases, both the Vitamin D deficient person and their doctor believe that they are having 'absorption' problems. This lack of knowledge about the need for magnesium ends up causing serious issues such as:
http://www.naturalnews.com/029195_magne ... in_D.html#
AdiosMS
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by AdiosMS »

Reading these posts makes me nervous. I have been taking D2 ergocal 1.25 CP (50,000 U) 3X/week for over a year. It was prescribed by my general doctor after my labs came back very low.
Should I be concerned about taking this dosage over an extended period? I don't seem to have any side effects, but it's hard to distinguish some things as I also have afib, which causes my heart to race. I had to give up the afib med as my stomach was being ruined.

Help!
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jimmylegs
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by jimmylegs »

taking magnesium would be a win win - it would help your body make use of the d3 while providing protection against depletion effects.

and for the hat trick (ie the third win):

http://www.ajconline.org/article/0002-9 ... tract?cc=y
"To study the effect of hypomagnesemia on control of atrial fibrillation (AF), serum magnesium levels were determined in 45 consecutive patients with symptomatic AF; 20% were hypomagnesemic (serum magnesium less than 1.5 mEq/liter)."

as usual, hypomagnesemia is very poorly defined in this study. 1.5 mEq/l = 1.8 mg/dL and while the 'normal' range is often given as 1.5-2.5, healthy optimal is more like 2.3-2.7. sadly, this is not a study i can get full text access for, so we'll just have to imagine what percentage of participants would have turned out to be hypomagnesemic using 2.3 as the cutoff. i would bet money it would be 100% or very close to it.

here's another study showing higher risk of AF with lower serum magnesium:
http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/ear ... 2511.short
quartile.....Serum Mg (mg/dL)......incident rate/1000 person-yrs
Lowest.....≤1.77......................... 9.4
Second.....1.78–1.88 ...................6.9
Third........1.89–1.98 ...................7.1
Highest..........≥1.99 ...................6.3

again, not really anywhere close to 2.3-2.7 range for serum Mg.

daily magnesium intake target: 600mg/d when symptomatic, can be 400mg/d for maintenance purposes

magnesium rich foods http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tnam ... #foodchart
magnesium rich water (not easy to come by) http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/feb ... ter_01.htm
check it out, a water recipe just for afibbers! http://www.afibbers.org/Wallerwater.pdf
best supplemental form i've found yet: magnesium glycinate.
example: http://orangenaturals.com/essential/mag ... g_60v_cap/
forms like magnesium oxide just aren't worth it.

Effects of magnesium on atrial fibrillation after cardiac surgery: a meta-analysis
http://heart.bmj.com/content/91/5/618.short
"Magnesium administration is an effective prophylactic measure for the prevention of postoperative AF."
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AdiosMS
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by AdiosMS »

In looking for the mineral rich waters, what I found was Gerolsteiner. It has the following mineral content per liter:

1. Calcium 345
2. Bicarbonate 1,800
3. magnesium 345
4. sodium 45
5. potassium 10
6. sulfate 35
7. chloride 40

Now, the question is: Is this worthwhile purchasing & drinking? The other waters you recommended I could not find in the U.S. here in a major city.
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jimmylegs
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by jimmylegs »

hey there :) 345mg in a litre is good, and the balance with the calcium content is appropriate.

hi :) i think whether it's worthwhile is really up to your opinion and budget.

personally i would want to try to get my daily 400-600mgs via a combination of organic food (conventional produce loads phosphorus which in turn depletes magnesium), mineral rich water, and if necessary, a supplement.

organic produce and mineral rich waters have beneficial natural combinations of nutrients, but they cost more. supplements can be cheaper per serving, but may vary widely in quality depending on the form. it can also be difficult to balance single supplements appropriately with other nutrients.

maybe you can find food/water/supplements combination that works with your budget. maybe a litre or two a week, with healthy food and a daily 200mg supplement in the mix as well? i'd expect the water to be a pretty expensive way to meet the daily requirement all by itself.
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TeresaL
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Re: Vitamin D

Post by TeresaL »

I have been doing the high dose vitamin D3 ...per Dr Ciscero...60,000iu per day. I have many blood test every 6 Wks to check kidney function, etc. and I drink 2.5 liters of water to wash away calcium. No calcium or milk products allowed.
Recently ran out of D3 for a wk..as a result started feeling worse. Never again.
Dr Ciscero patients are symptom free within 2 yrs!
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