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r Health Conscious Reader,Vitamin D can keep you from having a heart attack. It’s as simple as that.
Not only that, it does it with no side effects.
I’m not being dramatic here. In fact, just last month, I found more proof.
Researchers proved that people with the highest levels of vitamin D had a 43 percent lower rate of heart disease.1
And if that’s not enough, another study I read in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that vitamin D can decrease your risk of cancer by up to 77%.2
In all my medical training, I’ve never found a single drug to ever, ever deliver results like that.
Yet doctors continue to turn to statin drugs when treating their patients.
Statins should never be a doctor’s first or only choice. Statins come with side effects that can be devastating.
Some of the most common side effects are muscle aches, fatigue, joint pain, and impotence. Fatigue can be so bad that you can’t exercise. And, if you do exercise, you get sore and you don’t recover easily.
You can also develop a condition called rhabdomyolysis.3 This is when your muscle cells begin to break down. You become sore and weak. But you may have other symptoms, like nausea or an abnormal heart rate. It can develop into kidney failure.
It’s hell to be on a statin. Roy, my friend from college, told me, “If this is how it feels, I’d rather be dead.”
The way statins work is that they block an enzyme needed to make cholesterol. But you need cholesterol to synthesize vitamin D in your body. So you end up with lower and lower levels of vitamin D.
If you’re worried about it, vitamin D levels can be measured in your blood. But everyone in today’s world needs more vitamin D.
I recommend you get vitamin D from natural sources like the sun. Go outside and expose your body to sunlight every day. As little as 10 minutes in the midday sun produces 10,000 units of vitamin D.
But if this is impossible, as it is for some people, add sources of vitamin D to your diet. Below is a list of foods that contain vitamin D. Look how much you get from cod liver oil and herring. You can get a day’s supply from either one.
|
Source |
Amount |
IUs |
|
Cod liver oil |
1 Tbsp. |
1360 |
|
Herring |
3 Oz. |
1383 |
|
Catfish |
3 Oz. |
425 |
|
Salmon, cooked |
3.5 Oz. |
360 |
|
Mackerel, cooked |
3.5 Oz. |
345 |
|
Sardines, canned in oil, drained |
1.75 Oz. |
250 |
|
Tuna, canned in oil |
3 Oz. |
200 |
|
Eel, cooked |
3.5 Oz. |
200 |
|
Pork spare ribs |
3 Oz. |
88 |
|
Beef liver, pan-fried |
3 Oz. |
42 |
|
Egg, whole |
One |
25 |
If you need to supplement, I recommend you aim for a minimum of 2,000 I.U. of vitamin D per day. If your level tests low, take between 5,000 and 10,000 I.U. a day from a variety of sources. There is no worry of toxicity at this level.
To Your Good Health,
Al Sears, MD
- Parker, J., Hashmi, O., et al. “Levels of vitamin D and cardiometabolic disorders: Systematic review and meta-analysis.” MATURITAS. 2010 Mar: 65(3):225-236.
- Lappe. “Vitamin D and calcium supplementation reduces cancer risk: results of a randomized trial.” Am J Clin Nutr. 2007; 85(6):1586-1591.
- Schreiber, H. Anderson, T. “Statin-Induced rhabdomyolysis.” Ophthalmology. 2006 Aug; 31(2):177-180.