Vitamin D is among those that play fundamental roles for the proper functioning of our body. There shortage of this vitamin, that is a low or insufficient quantity of the latter in our organism, affects about one billion people around the world. Calcitriol, which is the active form of vitamin D, it is the basic unit that guarantees bone health, therefore it is of fundamental importance for the integrity of our skeletal system. How do we know if our body suffers from vitamin D deficiency?
To check the real levels of vitamin D present in our body it is necessary to go to an analysis laboratory and request the measurement of blood levels of 25-hydroxy-vitamin D e 1.25 hydroxy-vitamin D. In the event that a more or less important deficiency of this vitamin is found, it is important to know the consequences to which it is encountered; these can vary based on many factors such as, for example, age: rickets in the case of boys, osteomalacia in adults e osteoporosis in the elderly and in menopausal women.
Where does the vitamin deficiency in our body come from? It should be noted that this should normally be synthesized by the organism itself but it is also possible to introduce it through the diet. When our body fails to synthesize and / or assimilate it, the causes can be many, including: taking some medications, kidney and liver disease, or an increase in daily requirement. Experts advise us that an excellent natural method to increase the levels of vitamin D in our body is to regularly expose ourselves to sunlight.
What are the roles that vitamin D plays within our body? As we will see there are many and all of great importance, but among these they stand out: it helps growth in children, it strengthens the bones, accelerates the absorption of calcium and phosphorus by kidneys and facilitates the absorption of calcium inintestine. As already mentioned above, it is possible to introduce vitamin D also through food: those that contain a greater quantity of it are mushrooms, eggs, fish from which the liver oil of cod.
Vitamin D is also called the “Vitamin of the sun” as a continuous and targeted exposure to sunrays it involves the activation of an endogenous production by the organism itself of this vitamin. But it is necessary to point out that it is not such a simple step: in fact, the newly generated vitamin is found in the inactive form and to pass to the active one must undergo reactions of hydroxylation in the kidneys and liver. Only after doing this the vitamin is active and has the aforementioned beneficial effects.