This may come as a surprise but did you know that most people lack in vitamin D?  Over 77 percent of Americans today are insufficient in vitamin D and one billion people worldwide (over half of the population) are actually deficient in vitamin D. Pretty crazy stuff, right?

Causes Of Vitamin D Deficiencies

There’s a misconception out there that with regular exposure to sunlight, one will have a sufficient amount of vitamin D in their body. However, that isn’t always the case. Your skin does make vitamin D with regular sunlight but most people are still not getting adequate amounts of sun exposure, which is a major cause of a deficiency.  

Some of the other major factors that determine how much vitamin D you’re actually making include:

• Where you live – Do you live in a place where it’s sunny or cloudy?
• Your age – The older you get the less your skin is able to make vitamin D from sunlight alone.
• Your skin color – Lighter-skin people make more vitamin D than darker-skinned people.
• Time of Day – During mid-day you make more vitamin D.
• Time of year – What season are you in? Summer you’re more liking to make more vitamin D than winter. 

Other causes of vitamin D deficiency can come from your food source. About 20% of your vitamin D intake should be coming from food and nutraceuticals, however, there are very few foods out there that provide a significant amount of vitamin D, hence where deficiencies come into play.

Why Vitamin D Is Important

Let’s talk about why your body needs this nutrient, shall we? Vitamin D plays a significant role in your body and overall health, for that matter.

Vitamin D is a big one when it comes to immune health. It produces strong bones and muscles. It’s fantastic for brain health and stabilizing your mood, plus it keeps your heart, lungs, and kidney function super healthy and it aids in weight loss.  

Here’s where vitamin D also plays a key role. It also can help regulate insulin levels. Now, this is big because it helps manage your blood sugar and helps to prevent diabetes. As of 2018, 34.2 million Americans had diabetes with that number on the rise today.

Aside from immune health and regulating blood sugar levels, vitamin D also helps fight and protect against autoimmune diseases because of its anti-inflammatory benefits. Research shows that vitamin D also has therapeutic benefits that it offers for numerous conditions including:

• Autoimmune disease
• Cancer
• Cardiovascular disease
• Depression
• Infectious diseases
• Osteoporosis

How to Get More Vitamin D Into Your Body

Vitamin D is a necessity to your overall health and the nice thing about this nutrient is that there are easy ways to get more of it into your body! Here are some ways you can aid your body with the proper amount of vitamin D it needs to help your body function properly: 

Get Some Sunshine – Although the sunshine can be harmful to our bodies when exposed to ultraviolet (UV) radiation in large quantities, it’s still important to soak up a minimal amount throughout the day. Ideally, and on average, you want to try for about 10-30 minutes of sunlight several times a week without sunscreen.  

Incorporate Whole, Unprocessed Foods Rich in Vitamin D Into Your Diet – According to MaxLiving, “fatty fish and pasture-raised eggs are good food sources. You’ll find these and other foods with good amounts of vitamin D in the Core and Advanced Plans.”

Supplement Your Vitamin D – MaxLiving offers high-quality supplements, one being  the Vitamin D3 + Probiotics. Incorporating a nutraceutical like this one into your daily regimen will help you to get the adequate amount of vitamin D your body needs without having to worry about it. Since vitamin D is also shown to contribute to gut health, supplementing with a nutraceutical that also includes prebiotics or probiotics is a great idea. The nutrients in them help to feed the good gut flora; minimizing and preventing any gut imbalances.

The key takeaway here is that vitamin D is an important nutrient to have in your body, but unfortunately, many people are lacking in having a significant amount of it present in their bodies. Remember, you have the power to command your health and make the changes necessary to live a life full of optimal health!

Here at Imperium Health Center in Littleton, Colorado, we believe that spinal care and correction are the core of whole-body healing, but chiropractic care doesn’t work alone. For optimum health, spinal care combined with nutrition, mindset, minimizing toxins, exercising, and supplementing correctly, are the components needed to greatly improve your life.