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Vitamin D deficiency and Covid-19 mortality [pdf]

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Re: Vitamin D deficiency and Covid-19 mortality [pdf]

#171

Post by devaboone »

graeme wrote: post #168
devaboone wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, I'm the wife. High dose Vitamin D can cause elevated calcium levels (meaning over 10.0 mg/dl for adults over 40, it can be a little higher for younger adults). I usually don't see that occur with doses at 2-3 K IU daily. You can also check your Vitamin D 25-OH levels (the level that will be done if you just get a standard "Vitamin D level") and these should be in a reasonable range. What constitutes reasonable ma…

Great answer, thanks. So measuring blood levels of vitamin D and setting a specific target no higher than 50 ng/ml should be enough to avoid this problem for most people? Or could taking a high daily dose for a short time to get to the desired blood level cause trouble as well? Finally, do you see much difference in getting to that high blood level of vitamin D from sun exposure vs D in diet (fish, etc) vs supplement…

Some people can tolerate Vitamin D levels above 50, so I wouldn't set that as an absolute cutoff - a Vitamin D in the 50s is good for many people, but I definitely don't want to see it above 70. Taking a higher dose for a short period of time is completely acceptable, as long as it doesn't become something that you stay on for years. It is really hard, if not impossible, to get toxic levels of Vitamin D solely from the sun or diet. I only see it with people taking supplements. And usually it's not a low dose of supplements. (And actually, many people don't even realize that they are getting high doses of Vitamin D. It is added to a lot of vitamins and supplements - so that supplement you take for hair growth may contain a few thousand units of Vitamin D, for example. I ask everyone to get out all of their supplements and look through for vitamin D.) In general, getting vitamins and minerals from diet is preferable to getting from supplements.

Re: Vitamin D deficiency and Covid-19 mortality [pdf]

#172

Post by graeme »

conorh wrote: post #107
keldaris wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you elaborate in more detail? Given your wife's background, I'd guess you were referring to people with pre-existing hyperparathyroidism who are therefore prone to quickly develop hypercalcaemia from even modest Vitamin D supplementation, but perhaps there's more to it? If your wife wants to write a blog post on the subject, I'm sure there'd be a lot of interest.

She was thinking about writing a blog post on Vitamin D already and she says she will it in the next few days and I'll post it here when she does. She is not talking about patients with pre-existing hyperparathyroidism - they often think they have it because the calcium is high, but it is only high because of the vitamin D!

You/she should put an email signup on her site or in a comment here. Would help people see the eventual article.

Re: Vitamin D deficiency and Covid-19 mortality [pdf]

#173

Post by dang »

devaboone wrote: post #171
graeme wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great answer, thanks. So measuring blood levels of vitamin D and setting a specific target no higher than 50 ng/ml should be enough to avoid this problem for most people? Or could taking a high daily dose for a short time to get to the desired blood level cause trouble as well? Finally, do you see much difference in getting to that high blood level of vitamin D from sun exposure vs D in diet (fish, etc) vs supplement…

Some people can tolerate Vitamin D levels above 50, so I wouldn't set that as an absolute cutoff - a Vitamin D in the 50s is good for many people, but I definitely don't want to see it above 70. Taking a higher dose for a short period of time is completely acceptable, as long as it doesn't become something that you stay on for years. It is really hard, if not impossible, to get toxic levels of Vitamin D solely from t…

Sorry about the rate limiting! That's a new-account issue, and I hate that it affects perfectly legit new accounts. I've switched that off now, so she can post freely. If you'd like, we can transfer your comments beginning "From devaboone" to her username. (Edit: done now, by permission via email. The parent comment was originally posted by conorh.)

(All: when you see issues like this affecting HN threads and feel like doing a good deed, please alert us at hn@ycombinator.com. We see all the emails but often have no idea what's going on in the threads.)

Re: Vitamin D deficiency and Covid-19 mortality [pdf]

#174

Post by TacoToni »

r00fus wrote: post #31
BurningFrog wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Technically true, but you should still eat vitamin D supplements. It's very cheap and safe, so worst case it has less effect than you hope. You can overdose, but you have to really crazy with the dosage. Also 1: Vitamin D supplements do cure rickets. Also 2: All of us who eat supplements should show up in the stats as high in vitamin D, so the data does partially cover that case.

What brand/strength of VitaminD supplements do you all take?

Thone 5,000 IU once per day (qd)

Re: Vitamin D deficiency and Covid-19 mortality [pdf]

#175

Post by cactus2093 »

devaboone wrote: post #143
wpasc wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you mind elaborating on what you mean by "wacky" levels? I can't tell from your comment if that means high or low. Asking as a Vitamin D supplement user who uses 2-3k IU a day

Hi, I'm the wife. High dose Vitamin D can cause elevated calcium levels (meaning over 10.0 mg/dl for adults over 40, it can be a little higher for younger adults). I usually don't see that occur with doses at 2-3 K IU daily. You can also check your Vitamin D 25-OH levels (the level that will be done if you just get a standard "Vitamin D level") and these should be in a reasonable range. What constitutes reasonable ma…

Would you still consider 5,000 IU of Vitamin D per day safe as far as these calcium issues go?

I had a doctor tell me to take that dose for at least a few months a few years ago after low levels in my bloodwork during the winter. But I've never known if I should lower the dose to take on a continuing basis or adjust during the summer when I get a little more sun (but I still work in an office/at home so spend a lot of time indoors, especially now).

Re: Vitamin D deficiency and Covid-19 mortality [pdf]

#176

Post by batrachom »

This article is (badly) written by un-qualified authors (two software developers). This would be enough to raise at least a few red flags on the conclusions drawn here. Has it even been peer reviewed? From a first look, there no way this work would have been published by any reputable journal.

If there is any truth in what the authors claim, the best they could do is to work with field experts and/or submit their findings to a reputable journal for review and publishing. Someone's health might be on the line following pseudo-scientific works.

Re: Vitamin D deficiency and Covid-19 mortality [pdf]

#179

Post by cbsmith »

batrachom wrote: post #176

This article is (badly) written by un-qualified authors (two software developers). This would be enough to raise at least a few red flags on the conclusions drawn here. Has it even been peer reviewed? From a first look, there no way this work would have been published by any reputable journal. If there is any truth in what the authors claim, the best they could do is to work with field experts and/or submit their fin…

Yeah, this seems to be mostly idle speculation than an actual study... and it ignores a preponderances of additional data (like, say... COVID-19 cases in the US).

Re: Vitamin D deficiency and Covid-19 mortality [pdf]

#180

Post by r0fl »

devaboone wrote: post #171
graeme wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great answer, thanks. So measuring blood levels of vitamin D and setting a specific target no higher than 50 ng/ml should be enough to avoid this problem for most people? Or could taking a high daily dose for a short time to get to the desired blood level cause trouble as well? Finally, do you see much difference in getting to that high blood level of vitamin D from sun exposure vs D in diet (fish, etc) vs supplement…

Some people can tolerate Vitamin D levels above 50, so I wouldn't set that as an absolute cutoff - a Vitamin D in the 50s is good for many people, but I definitely don't want to see it above 70. Taking a higher dose for a short period of time is completely acceptable, as long as it doesn't become something that you stay on for years. It is really hard, if not impossible, to get toxic levels of Vitamin D solely from t…

What is a “not low dose” of vitamin D? Would 5000iU a day still be low? 10,000iu?

Is it really possible to have enough vitamin d exposure just from diet for someone who lives in a northern state which doesn’t get nearly as many sunny days as a place like florida or california?

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