Strategies to Prevent and Treat Vitamin D Deficiency
Hi Everyone!
Wow very sorry for not writing in such a long time. It’s been a little difficult these days as second-year medical school has been much busier than I thought it would be. I wanted to post up this table from Dr. Michael Holick’s New England Journal of Medicine review article (N Engl J Med 2007;357:266-81) on Vitamin D defiency and how to prevent it. Basically, many many people we care about – 1 billion worldwide, have vitamin D deficiency. It’s very sad, because not having enough vitamin D can contribute to many diseases — like osteoporosis, and even common cancers, autoimmune disease, infectious disease and heart disease. Please if you get a chance, read the Holick article (http://www.uvadvantage.org/portals/0/pdf/NEJournalofMedicine.pdf). And check out the following table, which is from that article, which can help you make some of your decisions together with your doctor.
Best wishes!
Jeff
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About
Dear All, I’m currently a third-year medical student with interests in everything related to medicine. In 2006, I studied acupuncture at the Beijing University of Traditional Chinese Medicine for three months. For the past two and half years, I’ve been working with a pediatric surgeon at the Children’s Hospital of Boston on liver dysfunction, as well as on omega-3 fatty acids in children with short bowel syndrome.
I am fascinated by the potential of surgery, nutrition and complementary medicine. At the same time, I’m disturbed by the lack of evidence that surrounds some medical practices. I’m also deeply concerned about the conflicts of interest that are pervasive in the mainstream and complementary medical world. We often hear of how pharmaceutical companies have influence on doctors — this week’s New England Journal of Medicine paper written by Dr. Blumenthal’s team talks about these issues (April 26th, 2007). Less talked about, but equally important, is how herbal companies and natural medicine doctors are vulnerable to quality lapses, financial influence as well. For my posts, I will try to be aware about this and please let me know if you start to see me slipping in my awareness.
I’m going to try my best to talk about issues that are directly relevant to your health and my health — but avoid rehashing topics that you hear about all the time. Most likely, the posts will be on things that have frustrated my professors, or topics that really need to be told but for some reason haven’t gotten out to the public — such as preventable medical errors or important nutritional information that everyone should know about.
Lately, this past year, I’m in the hospital for most of my third-year, which makes it difficult to post new topics, but I’ve been trying to add some posts on my Youtube page. I apologize for taking a long time to get back to your comments, but I plan to answer all of your e-mails, it may take a while though and I am very sorry about that.
I hope you will stay with me throughout my four years in medical school and in residency. Please e-mail me at unitedstatesmedicalstudent@gmail.com.
(I also have Youtube videos if you find this is of help).
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=usmedstudent
Thank you for reading!
Jeff
P.S. I wanted to point out something important: I’m just a medical student, my posts are hopefully conversation starters, but only conversation starters — not medical advice. If my posts intrigue you, please read more about the topic and discuss about it with your doctor. I’d be happy to send you the information on the journal articles I talk about. Also, the opinions expressed in this blog are not necessarily those of Harvard Medical School, its affiliated institutions, or Harvard University. Best wishes!
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Hi! I finally did the blog thing. My first writing is rather emotive, but I will start writing more about some research soon. This site is confusing….
anyway, I look forward to reading more of your stuff.
Best regards,
Anja.
hey,i happened to see you videos on youtube.I think your idea is quite interesting und unprecedented(thanks to the modern technolgy,it wouldn’t be possible in the past)
Anyway,i am a medical student from the University of Heidelberg,Germany.Nice to meet you!
Greetings from Heidelberg!
oooops!I meant to say interesting “and” unprecedented.”und”=”and” in German ^^
Hello
First I want to thank you for your website. You are doing great work. I appreciate all the information you have made available.
I came across your site while searching for information about Vitamin D deficiency. I have been not feeling well for a long long time. I have flu like aches and tired no energy. The doctors always see the depression and although I have tried many kinds of antidepressants,I stopped taking them….none helped some made me feel worse. I have continued to feel really sick. Just last week a doctor I saw did a Vitamin D test and it came back a 5..the lowest on the scale. He had said that he wanted to take the test only because someone in the mental health department had mentioned that sometimes people with depression have low vitamin D levels. I have been reading up about it and am wondering if this could be the reason I have been feeling so badly. No one ever did this test on me. I am waiting to hear from my doctor to see what he is going to advise next. I don’t feel confident that I will get the correct tests because I am in a HMO and getting referred to a specialist is often difficult. After reading about the dangers of such a low reading, I am worried and not sure what to ask for when I talk to my doctor. I am concerned there is an underlying cause for this low reading and if the doctor just prescribes the vitamin D for me to take without ordering the other tests to determine what is causing my low reading, What other tests should be run on someone like me with such a very low reading? I appreciate any suggestions. I am still waiting to hear from my doctor. I viewd my test results on line and three days ago and am still waiting for a response from him as to what he is going to recommend.
Thank you so much.
ann
I read your blog for quite a long time and must tell that your posts always prove to be of a high value and quality for readers.