Vitamin D and Weight Loss

There are so many benefits of vitamin D including weight loss!

By Andrew Tomkinson

There appears to be a strong correlation between vitamin D and weight loss success. This is in addition to all the other health benefits of vitamin D.

Unfortunately, so many people are deficient in vitamin D that it becomes essential that they regularly consume foods that contain vitamin D in their diet.

Vitamin D functions
Vitamin D is well known as an essential vitamin that is very important for the formation, growth, and repair of bones. This vitamin also plays an important role in improving your immune function and also muscle strength.

Foods that contain Vitamin D
The dietary foods rich in vitamin D include: salmon, sardines, shrimp, milk, fish, egg, and cod. It can also be produced endogenously, when the skin is exposed to ultraviolet (UV) rays from the sunlight.

Vitamin D and Weight Loss
Since vitamin D is directly involved in calcium absorption, it becomes an important factor in how our bodies regulate weight. A study conducted at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis tested Vitamin D levels of thirty eight obese and overweight men and women.

At the same time it looked at the relationship between vitamin D and weight loss. According to the scientists, vitamin D levels predicted subsequent weight loss success in subjects on a weight loss diet whereby, an adequate vitamin D level correlated with greater weight loss success.

It was especially clear to scientists that Vitamin D was inversely correlated to abdominal fat and played a major role in weight loss success rates when combined with a low calorie diet.

Therefore, vitamin D and weight loss appear to be very closely correlated.

Health Benefits of Vitamin D
Vitamin D is the only vitamin that is also a hormone. After Vitamin D is made by the skin or eaten, the kidney and liver help to convert it into an active hormone form. As a hormone, itcontrols calcium absorption to help the body build strong bones and teeth, and it also helps to maintain muscle strength.

There are also a multitude of other reasons for a daily dose of this vitamin. Studies show that it could help to prevent life threatening conditions, ranging from heart and lung disease todiabetes and cancer.

Vitamin D can protect against cancer. The German Cancer Research Centre found that higher levels of vitamin D can cut the risk of colon – rectal cancer by up to 60 percent. Similar risk reductions have also been seen for breast and prostate cancers.

Also, one review found that not getting enough vitamin D could be responsible for several thousands of premature deaths from cancer each year. Vitamin D’s anti cancer activity is thought to be due to its role as a ‘nuclear transcription factor’ that regulates cell growth, differentiation, apoptosis (cell death) and other cellular mechanisms necessary for the development of cancer.

High doses of vitamin D can reduce levels of prostate specific antigen by half in 90 percent prostate cancer patients. The vitamin can slow progression of breast cancer as well.Although more research is needed, vitamin D may be a useful weapon against this deadly disease.

Vitamin D also brings benefits to the heart. Looking at vitamin D levels in 1739 older adults in relation to blood pressure and other cardiovascular risk factors; those with low levels ofthe vitamin had a 62 percent greater risk of a cardiovascular event compared with those who had higher levels.

Also, low levels of vitamin D are associated with a higher incidence of peripheral arterial disease (PAD), or narrowing of the arteries. On looking at nearly 5000 participants in theNational Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) from 2001 to 2004, those with the lowest vitamin D levels were 80 percent more likely to have PAD than those with the highest levels.

One of the various theories as to how vitamin D exerts its heart protective effects is that it inhibits inflammation, known to contribute to the development of atherosclerosis (fatty buildupin arteries). Vitamin D also appears to regulate the rennin-angiotensin system, which plays an important role in hypertension and cardiovascular health.

It’s known that vitamin D plays a key role in glucose homeostasis, and in insulin release and response, and is linked with the development of both type 1 and 2 diabetes. In a Finnishstudy of more than 12,000 babies followed for over 30 years, the children who regularly took vitamin D supplements had a lower rate of type 1 diabetes than those who did not, whilst those suspected of having rickets – another condition linked to vitamin D deficiency – had a threefold risk of diabetes.

Additional research from Finland reported that men with the highest levels of vitamin D had a 70 per cent lower risk of type 2 diabetes. By improving this condition, it is another way vitamin D and weight loss are connected.

As more and more research is being done, scientists are discovering that vitamin D may help to protect against a variety of other conditions, such as dementia, depression, asthma, multiple sclerosis and bacterial and viral infections.

Considering the dangerous drugs commonly used to treat these conditions, we should all be making sure that we’re consuming enough of the foods that contain vitamin D so we can obtain all the health benefits of vitamin D.

Overall, there are so many health benefits of vitamin D, especially vitamin D and weight loss, that it makes sense to ensure that we get adequate amounts of it.

For more information to help you lose weight fast, and improve your health and nutrition please click on the link below:

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