Vitamin for health – The role of Vitamin D in fighting inflammation - 1

New studies have revealed the power of Vitamin D to reduce inflammation and pain, operating at the DNA level to regulate genes to reduce inflammation.  This information sends a clear message to all those people out there that any kind of pain or ongoing inflammation, you should first do a test for Vitamin D called the 25-hydroxy vitamin D Test, and if found below normal, first thing to do is to optimize your vitamin D level as a key aspect of solving inflammatory problems. 

Research has also brought out a new light on this important Vitamin that is required for your body and helpful to fight inflammation.  The research shows a new receptor for Vitamin D on our DNA. When the Vitamin D lands on this receptor, then the core gene signaling takes place that reduces inflammation.  This is a powerful anti-inflammatory mechanism of our body.  If the person is lacking Vitamin D then this receptor cannot possible be activated in an optimal way, placing the person at higher risk for magnified inflammation from any health issue.

Vitamin D also helps control calcium and phosphate levels in your body.  Vitamin D is essential for strong bones, since it helps the body to use calcium from the diet.  Deficiency in Vitamin D has been strongly associated with rickets, this disease is in which the bone tissue doesn’t mineralize properly, leading to soft bones and skeletal deformities.

For some of us, in spite of taking in sun shine Vitamin D, there may be deficiency in Vitamin D, it could be due to

Medical problems affects body’s ability to create Vitamin D

Fat cells may also pull Vitamin D out of the blood make it unavailable to the rest of the body

People who deliberately avoid sun exposure, thinking of high risk of skin cancer

Having naturally dark skin, which lower levels of vitamin D-binding protein, thus causing Vitamin D deficiency.

If we go into details of the myriad benefits of Vitamin D, there will be pages to fill, hence a separate episode on Vitamins only will be published at a later stage.

Vitamin for health – The role of Vitamin D in fighting inflammation

Research has proved that Vitamin D role in fighting inflammation cannot be undermined.  It is important to note that Vitamin D’s anti-inflammatory affect in human have long been suspected.  Even a small amount of Vitamin D lowers inflammation by a large percentage.  It has also been found that many a patients are profoundly deficient in Vitamin D.  Vitamin D deficiency has been associated with numerous illness with inflammatory components such as hypertension, heart disease, diabetes, autoimmune illness and thus gains importance of maintaining a normal level of Vitamin D.  Hs C-Reactive Protein is elevated when there is acute or chronic inflammation and it has been observed and tested and proved that people who take in Vitamin D reduces HS CRP automatically, this does not mean that the cause of the inflammation is cured, the cause remains but cooling down the inflammation keeps them from doing more damage to the organs that is affected.

Vitamin D is easily available in most parts of the world but in some parts of the world, it is not easily available and hence requirement for Vitamin D capsule cannot be ruled out since this is one of the important vitamin that a body needs for the day to day functioning.  The natural source of Vitamin D is the Sun.  Our body creates vitamin D from direct sunlight on our skin when we are outdoors, most of us should be able to get all the vitamin D we need from sunlight.  You need to sit under the early morning sun for 10 to 15 minutes not the ultraviolet sun in the afternoon.  The precursors of Vitamin D, that is, molecules that produce the Vitamin D, present in your skin are activated by the Sun, so soaking some morning is a good idea, health-wise.  We can also get some vitamin D from our foods including oily fish such as salmon, mackerel, sardines, red meat and egg.  So I would suggest that you take in Vitamin D daily irrespective of whether you are sick or not since Vitamin D is required for all human being but for those with inflammation, it is a necessity.

What is allergy and the cause of Allergy?

We need to know that at the core of our immune system is the ability of our body to differentiate between self and non-self.  An allergy occurs when your body’s immune system sees a certain substance as harmful though it might be a harmless substance such as pollen or dust.   The immune system reacts by causing an allergic reaction.  Substances that cause allergic reactions are called allergens.  This attack by the immune system on the harmless substance is called allergy.  For example, some people have dust allergy while some have pollen allergy.  Before we go further we need to know what are antibody.  Antibody is a blood protein produced in response to and counteracting a specific antigen (a toxin or other foreign substances).  During production by the immune system, in cases where the antibodies react to non-threatening proteins, such as those found in pollens, then allergy results.  In people with such allergies, what happens is that the immune system mistakenly identifies the particular allergen as an invader and begins to create antibodies against it.  These antibodies, called the IgE, attach themselves to mast cells (mast cells are "master regulators" of the immune system. They come from bone marrow and go into all tissues of the body. Each mast cell contains secretory granules (storage sacs), each containing powerful biologically active molecules called mediators), which are abundant under the surface of the skin and in the nose, eyes, lungs and gastrointestinal tract.  When the allergen is encountered, the IgE antibodies grab it, triggering the mast cells to release powerful chemicals including histamine.  This causes the allergic reaction.  A reaction often occurs within minutes or up to a few hours after contact and may lead to many different symptoms.

In a sense, allergy can be thought of as one extreme on a spectrum and autoimmune disorders the other extreme on a spectrum.  Health is thus a balance between the two where the immune response is always appropriate and controlled.  If anything goes out of sync then we have one illness after another, a never ending cycle of illness.