Low vitamin D

Hi Pog.......you may/may not have seen me post on this subject before...briefly: I had the same stat as you-------level of 25. Took 1000 IU p/day for 6 months which brought it up to a whopping 36. My doctor presribed 50,000 IU p/wk for 12 weeks and retested. Came up to 57. I've continued for another 12 weeks and will get retested on 1/3/11------Hope to see the level @75. If so, I'll switch to maintenance dose to keep it there. Interestingly, I've been battling low T for a while, and w/o supplementing at all, it rose from 337 to 496. Vit D-3, in addtion to being beneficial for all the things you mentioned, is a prohormone, and not an actual vitamin. It is a necessary component of the endocrine sytem relating to hormone levels. Keep us posted on your results.

Arnie in DE

My understanding is that D3 is fat soluble.  Many D3 supplements are packaged in oil (fat) filled gel caps.  I was told if I were to take a dry siupplement, that I should sprinkle it over a piece of buttered bread .... I would guess that whole grained bread dipped in olive oil would do just fine. 

I take a vitamin D gel cap at the evening meal (I'm most likely to get fat at that meal) along with a fish oil gel cap.  

My stats are similar 27 before taking supplements, 33 when taking 3000 IU / day. My dietician (she is on staff at the cancer ctr at UCSF, and a specialist in oncological nutrition) said that most recent research data is mixed as to the effectiveness of more Vitamin D above 4,000 IU per day. It just doesn't seem to have the same effect in clinical practice as it does in the lab.

She said that in the winter months, if you're in the 30 - 50 range it's probably ok; in the summer your D levels will be higher (unless you never get outside.)

Arnie, are you saying that Vitamin D can raise testosterone? Would low T then also correlate with low vit D? If that's true then I can't help but wonder if lowering T through HT could depress D levels. Also, whether raising D with high-dose supplements might make it harder to keep the T levels down.

As I said, mine tested this low even though I was already taking 2000 iu per morning, and yes I have enough oil and protein in my breakfast. I could be wrong, but I have a hunch that my PCP isn't experienced with this particular problem. Hopefully taking it for 8 weeks, or however long it takes to raise it, is enough.

Pog & RCS-------there is a correlation due to the fact that Vit. D-3 is a prohormone. If you google Vit. D and T, you'll get some info on this. Of course, this gets into whether or not it is safe for T levels to rise for post-treatment prostate guys, and there is the conventional wisdom, which says it isn't, and the newer studies which say it not only is, but might be beneficial. Vitamin D-3 is a natural aromatase inhibitor, meaning that it blocks the binding of T  to receptors and allows it to freely enter cells and do its thing. It also blocks the conversion of T to estrogen and DHT with the same net results. I think that is what happened to me. It still isn't enough to provide the libido I once enjoyed, but it has improved other areas that were deficient.  I will be meeting with my uro on 1/17 to review the latest results and see where we go from here, be it T supplementation, or finding things, both natural and RX, that will further block the adverse conversion of T that I manufacture naturally. Theoretically, at 337, I had enough T and free T for PCa cells to latch onto if they were going to. Now, at 496 in October, they definitely do. We'll see what the latest PSA level is next month..........with my pathology following surgery in 1/09, my uro is semi-comfortable looking into T supplementation. (3+4 Gleason, low tumor volume, 3.9 PSA prior to surgery, negative margins, lymph nodes, seminal vesicles-whole 9 yards on that), but has waited to the 2-yr mark to have the frank discussion/decision. I guess that guys with more adverse stats would have to watch what D-3 would do to their levels of T if they were concerned and watching that. But again, the emerging studies indicate that overall, getting levels of D-3 up to optimal range is a good thing.

Arnie in DE

I continue to take 5000 iu daily. Since the fall my vit D blood level dropped from 65 to 52. I will continue at this level of suppliment unless my levels drop further.

Another view on vitamin D from a recent article in the New York times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/30/health/30vitamin.html?ref=dietarysupplementsandherbalremedies

A couple of quotes from this article:

"The very high levels of vitamin D that are often recommended by doctors and testing laboratories — and can be achieved only by taking supplements — are unnecessary and could be harmful, an expert committee says. "

and

"Some labs have started reporting levels of less than 30 nanograms of vitamin D per milliliter of blood as a deficiency. With that as a standard, 80 percent of the population would be deemed deficient of vitamin D, Dr. Rosen said. Most people need to take supplements to reach levels above 30 nanograms per milliliter, he added.

But, the committee concluded, a level of 20 to 30 nanograms is all that is needed "

Vit D suppliments only pose a risk if not monitored. If you are deficient why wouldn't you take suppliments and monitor until you hit you goal.

Hi questionaboutit,

Vitamin D3 is Fat soluble, if you are not taking it after eating some fats then yes you are wasting your money as it will not be absorbed. Fiber is an enemy of fat soluble supplements, Fats are your friend ( good fats work, ex olive oil, flax or fish oil, etc)

We all would like to have a bullet to stop the growth of prostate cancer cells. However, the combination of vitamin D (available only by prescription) with low doses of an over-the-counter painkiller seems to be still far to be proven effective to stop the growth.

As pointed out in the article by David Feldman, MD, who has been studying vitamin D for 25 years, “… It’s hard to make an exact comparison, as we are talking about cells in a dish and not a person...”
It would be more credible if results from a clinical trial in men could be produced.

Take care
Baptista

That Stanford study with VitaminD + Ibuprofen was done in 2005, and it was mentioned that the clinical trials have started. I supposed they should be finished by now. Anyone know the results?

I love the vitamin threads, but the info is so conflicting that I'm at a loss for whether to resume my supplement schedule or to forget it. I read prior to my surgery that chondroitin was linked to higer pca risk, even lycopene--- in supplement form, and more recently fish oil. I do believe there is some efficacy in taking supplements, but I'm not sure whether to chalk all the "studies" up to agenda battles or reality. Sort of like coffee being good for you one year but a potential killer the next... who knows what to believe sometimes.