Thursday 25 August 2011

New Zealands Most Important Vitamin

Because vitamin D deficiency is becoming implicated in such a wide range of disease conditions, researchers are increasing the amount of work targeting vitamin D.
New Zealand researchers have expertise in a number of physiological conditions and lifecycle stages where vitamin D deficiency is potentially damaging to health in both the short and long term. These include bone health, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, obesity and muscle strength, and during pregnancy, infancy and childhood, as well as older age.
Several of the recent trials have shown that a substantial number of the population have blood levels of this vitamin that is well below the optimum level. The actual requirement of Vitamin D and the dose rate that is recommended has changed markedly in the last year or so with researchers and medical professionals world wide suggesting that current rates are far too low and could be substantially lifted without any danger of toxicity or side effects. The former adult recommendation of some 1000 U.I. is seen as too low and many are recommending rates in the 2000 - 3000 I.U. range.
A 6 months study by Dr John Livesey of some 200 Christchurch adults showed they were almost all Vitamin D deficent during the period studied. His recommendation was that Christchurch adults should all be taking a daily dose of 2600 I.U. on a daily basis throughout the year. This study surprised The Wise Old Owl as it would be expected that over the summer sufficent sunlight would have been absorbed by the skin to produce adequate levels of Vitamin D, but that does not appear to be the case. Further studies by other researchers have come up with the same conclusion that a substantial porportion of the New Zealand population need Vitamin D supplementation. Blood testing of a broad sample of the population indicated that throughout New Zealand in the order of 50% of the population had below optimum levels of Vitamin D in their system
Vitamin D exists in 5 forms and it is Vitamin D3 (that is one manufactured in the body by sunlight) that is the important or critical one, so any supplementation either by diet or actual supplement should be in this form. This is the form used in NUZEACAL the bone health supplement produced by The Wise Old Owl and found on the website http://www.seniorhealthcare.co.nz
Another New Zealand website that has good Vitamin D information on is http://www.vitamind3.co.nz

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