How often should I check my Vitamin D blood level?

There are two different situations, in regard to this question:

a) You have been diagnosed with a low Vitamin D blood level and have started to fill up your vitamin D with supplement intake according to the advice of a vitamin D specialist:

If you alter your body’s daily uptake or production of vitamin D to a higher level than before, your blood vitamin D level is showing daily fluctuations for up too about two months until it stabilizes again. Right after the first activation step in the liver, vitamin D blood levels will rise, but then lower again, because it is absorbed by the cells of your body filling up their internal vitamin D storages for immediate requirements. Also, your fat cell will deplete part of the vitamin D in the blood and fill up your long-term vitamin D storage. It may take up to two months until this process reaches a new steady stake again. Thus you should wait for this period to reevaluate the success of your attempt to raise your blood vitamin D level to a higher level than before and to decide on whether you need to fill up more or you may continue with a supplementation sufficient to maintain the vitamin D blood level achieved,

b) Your daily vitamin D supplementation is stable and changes in overall vitamin D blood level are mainly caused by seasonal changes of vitamin D production in your skin:

You should check your blood vitamin D level at least two times per year in autumn and spring in order to decide on whether your body would benefit from additional vitamin D supplementation.

How to prevent potential Vitamin D over dosage effects?

If you have checked your blood vitamin D level with e.g. the VHC Vitamin-D Test your consultant/therapist is able to adjust his recommendations for individual vitamin D supplementation without any risk, even if he/she recommends a higher daily supplementation than what is printed on the product or the package insert. In general, Even long term vitamin D supplementation of up to 10.000 I.U. vitamin D per day is regarded as save, because this is just about the amount of vitamin D your body might produce on its own provided, there is sufficient skin exposition to sunlight containing the appropriate UV wavelengths during the summer period in the northern hemisphere.

How to use the VHC Vitamin-D Test to identify the individual maintainance dosage required to keep Vitamin D at an optimal level?

Based on a recent VHC Vitamin D test result, the blood vitamin D level you want to achieve level r maintain, your body weight, and some additional personal parameters, your vitamin D consultant/therapist is able to estimate your individual daily vitamin D requirements. However, this first assumption might need to be adjusted due to your body’s individual ability to resort and activate vitamin D provided as a supplement. He/she might thus recommend you to come back after about 2 months in order to run a second VHC Vitamin-D test and use its result to either confirm or readjust your daily supplementation recommendation for vitamin D.

Why did Vitamin D become such a central regulator during evolution?

The fact that part of the vitamin D activation is a process dependant on the availability and amount of UVB radiation in the range between 290-315 nm, has been used by nature since the early stages of evolution as tool to regulate all kind of gen activation processes connected with activity, energy uptake, growth, reproduction, but also protection. Algae started using it to estimate whether it makes sense to initiate the production all molecules required for photosynthesis’s and when to switch on the production of DNA repair and other proteins required to protect the cells from damage due to too high sun radiation.

Initially established in single cell photo- and phytoplankton the use of vitamin D as sensor and – once activated – powerful steroid hormone, has been maintained as a central „switch“ and is effecting the activity of several hundred genes in the human body. Just as in the primitive organisms it continues to regulate general activity, growth, regeneration and reproduction. Sufficient vitamin D supply is important through our whole live span. It has shown to have preventative effects against various common chronic, potential live threatening chronic diseases, associated to the industrialised society and its live style. Low vitamin D may even have negative effects on our mood and over time our mental health.

What is the half-time of Vitamin D levels if supplementation is discontinued or self production in the skin is diabled?

Our body’s vitamin D consumption is closely connected to its general availability in the body. The more vitamin D we have in our blood, the more active we are, and thus the more vitamin D we require to be supplied to our body in order to maintain a certain activity level. Once-daily vitamin D production in the skin is decreasing rapidly (such as in autumn) and/or daily supplementation is discontinued, blood vitamin D levels usually decrease quite rapidly. The halftime of vitamin D is only about 19 days and thus even the people who were able to build a good vitamin D level during summer may face vitamin D deficiency in winter.

As always there are individual differences, both in the ability to build up vitamin D in the skin during the summer period as well as in the individual vitamin D level during the winter period. In general and without supplementation about 50% of the population in Germany is vitamin D deficient even during the summer period. The level of vitamin D deficiency is rising to 80% during the winter period.

How does your blood Vitamin D level effect your bodies general requirements for vitamins and micronutrients?

If your blood vitamin D level is rising, this will switch on the capability of your body to activate numerous genes, many of them producing proteins that require vitamins or minerals or other micronutrients for their activity. As a result, your requirements and consumptions of vitamins, minerals, and micronutrients, in general, will rise and you should make sure sufficient supply by either your diet or supplementation to avoid any imbalances.

Special care should be taken on a sufficient supply of Magnesium and vitamin B2, as both of them are required by the proteins activating vitamin D in your body.

What is the minimum Vitamin D blood level required for preventative activity?

Vitamin D levels below 20 ng/ml are regarded as critical low to maintain such important body functions as bone growth and regeneration. However many gene activation processes of vitamin D require much higher levels than that. Based on numerous medical studies and scientific publications most experts recommend a level of at least 40 ng/ml as it was shown that at or above this level vitamin is showing preventative effects. A second hint, that 40 ng/ml should be the minimum level for good vitamin D supply is the fact that vitamin D is only showing up in the milk of breast-feeding women if the level is above 40 ng/ml. Vitamin D associations usually recommended achieving a vitamin D level of 40-60 ng/ml for the general public. For special purposes, e.g. to promote bone regeneration after surgery or to maximize physical power and endurance even higher vitamin D levels between 80 and 100 ng/ml seem to have optimal effects.

Is there a risk associated with the fact that vitamin D is fat soluble?

Sometime you will read that there is a risk of vitamin D overdosage associated o the fact that it is fat-soluble. However, this is in contrast to the finding that people with higher BMI (Body Mass Index) tend to be more likely vitamin D deficient than others. Obviously, vitamin D in the fat tissue is not directly contributing to the vitamin D blood level, because it not immediately available. Instead, the fat tissue is much more to be expected like a vitamin D sink that is a long-term vitamin D storage, only to be released in parallel to depleting the fat from the fat cells, such as in wintertime when overall nutrition is limited.

What is the reason that in the past only a Vitamin D blood concentration below 20 ng/ml was regarded as critical?

Vitamin D was initially identified in connection with the finding that cod-liver oil was found to be preventive and an effective treatment against a rickets, a childhood disease characterised by weak, soft and deformed bones. Further research revealed that UV-treatment had the same effect.

Rickets was found to develop only at Vitamin D levels below 20 ng/ml and initially low vitamin D was believed to be connected only with issues in bone formation in young children and elderly people. The idea that a Vitamin D level of 20 ng/ml may already be regarded as sufficient and does not require treatment is still widespread in part of the medical community and even some standard laboratory reporting.

In the last two decades medical studies and scientific research were able two proof that our body requires much higher blood vitamin d levels to keep all vitamin D dependant processes activated at an appropriate level . To dates common understanding of all vitamin d experts that regardless of age our body requires a vitamin d blood level of at least 40 ng/ml.

This message is spreading more and more in the last few years, due to intense activities of vitamin D experts and people, who have experienced how the adjustment of their own vitamin D level has improved their quality of life.

Why do certain skin care products have negative effects on Vitamin D production in the skin?

In order to produce vitamin in our skin we require direct exposure to UV light of a wavelength between 290 and 315 nm. Unfortunately these wavelengths are quite effectively blocked by current sun screen products. Applying sun screen with a protection factor of 10 or above will completely block your skins ability to produce vitamin D. Vitamin D production may even be blocked by many standard skin care products as many of them contain sun screen as standard ingredient to prevent skin ageing.

In order to enable your body to produce at least part of the required vitamin D in a natural way in summer you should thus not immediately apply sun screen whenever you go out between late in the morning or mid afternoon. Depending on your skin type your body has its own sun protection mechanisms and it may well tolerate unprotected sunlight for a certain amount of time every day without being damaged. You may ask your vitamin D consultant/therapist to estimate the safe self-protection time of your skin, based on your individual skin type and the local UV index of your area. Your skin health and it’s own vitamin d production capability will very much benefit if you apply any sun screen only after you have exceeded your individual local sun self-protection time every day.

In fact our skin itself requires high amounts of vitamin d for full activation of its internal sun damage prevention systems. Quite interestingly is the astonishing fact that dangerous forms of skin cancer in most cases show up in the skin areas with no or just minimum sun exposure, but not on the sun exposed, actively vitamin D producing areas. There is growing evidence that this is most likely connected to the activation of the skins immune and self-protection system by vitamin D.

How often should I check my Vitamin D blood level?

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