Group items tagged

It seems not a single day passes that I don't learn something new about this unique hormone (mis)named "vitamin D." \nFrom its humble beginnings recognized only as the factor responsible for bone maturation (with deficiency leading to childhood rickets), vitamin D now commands a recognized role in almost every conceivable aspect of health and disease. \n

In the July 2005 FASEB Journal, Adrian F. Gombart of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and his colleagues reported that vitamin D boosts production in white blood cells of one of the antimicrobial compounds that defends the body against germs.\n\nImmediately, Cannell says, the proverbial lightbulb went on in his head: Maybe the high doses of vitamin D that he had been prescribing to virtually all the men on his ward had boosted their natural arsenal of the antimicrobial, called cathelicidin, and protected them from flu. Cannell had been administering the vitamin D because his patients, like many other people in the industrial world, had shown a deficiency:

Is sunshine more than just a home remedy for a cold? New research suggests it may be: In a study that will be published tomorrow, people with low levels of vitamin D - also known as the "sunshine vitamin" - were more likely to catch cold and flu than folks with adequate amounts. The effect of the vitamin was strongest in people with asthma and other lung diseases who are predisposed to respiratory infections.

Association Between Serum 25-Hydroxyvitamin D Level and Upper Respiratory Tract Infection. \nAdit A. Ginde, MD, MPH; Jonathan M. Mansbach, MD; Carlos A. Camargo Jr, MD, DrPH . \nArch Intern Med. 2009;169(4):384-390\n

Plasma 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels in young children undergoing placement of tympanostomy tubes.\nLinday LA, Shindledecker RD, Dolitsky JN, Chen TC, Holick MF.\nAnn Otol Rhinol Laryngol. 2008 Oct;117(10):740-4.\nPMID: 18998501

Dietary supplementation with white button mushroom enhances natural killer cell activity in C57BL/6 mice. Wu D, Pae M, Ren Z, Guo Z, Smith D, Meydani SN. J Nutr. 2007 Jun;137(6):1472-7. PMID: 17513409

Well all have heard the world cancer many times,however very few people understand the disease and how it develops.Cancer can affect just about every organ

Vitamin D is a fat-soluble vitamin that is essential for maintaining normal calcium metabolism (1). Vitamin D3 (cholecalciferol) can be synthesized by humans in the skin upon exposure to ultraviolet-B (UVB) radiation from sunlight, or it can be obtained from the diet. Plants synthesize ergosterol, which is converted to vitamin D2 (ergocalciferol) by ultraviolet light. Vitamin D2 is less active in birds than vitamin D3 and may also be less active in humans (2). When exposure to UVB radiation is insufficient for the synthesis of adequate amounts of vitamin D3 in the skin, adequate intake of vitamin D from the diet is essential for health.

(NaturalNews) 30 years ago the famous Nobel laureate Linus Pauling said that vitamin C supplements can prevent cancer, a highly controversial statement at the time. Now a team of Johns Hopkins scientists have shown that vitamin C stops the growth of some tumors in mice. The Study The study was lead by Chi Dang, M.D., Ph.D., professor of medicine and oncology and Johns Hopkins Family Professor in Oncology Research. Their work is detailed in Cancer Cell, Volume 12, Issue 3, 230-238, 11 September, 2007. They found that the antioxidants' actual role may be to destabilize a tumor's ability to grow under conditions where there isn't enough oxygen to feed it. The conventional belief is that vitamin C helps prevent cancer growth by grabbing up volatile oxygen free radical molecules and preventing the damage they do to our DNA. "The potential anticancer benefits of antioxidants have been the driving force for many clinical and preclinical studies," Says Dang. "By uncovering the mechanism behind antioxidants, we are now better suited to maximize their therapeutic use."

Vitamin D and autoimmune rheumatic diseases. Cutolo M. Rheumatology (Oxford). 2009 Mar;48(3):210-2. Epub 2008 Oct 17. PMID: 18930963 doi:10.1093/rheumatology/ken394