Consumer

Over the weekend, the Huffington Post featured an article by Dr. Mark Hyman that focused on the findings of the Health Impact Studies, which were commissioned the Dietary Supplement Information Bureau.

Dr. Hyman praises the study's strictness and rigor, and there is an interesting conversation developing in the comments section. Check out the video below, in which Hyman discusses the studies at length:

Hop on over to the Post for the full article: How Dietary Supplement Reduce Health Care Cost, and review the entirety of the series of Health Impact studies right here, on DSIB: Health Impact Studies I-IV.

Jump into July with the DSIB Healthnotes Newsletter!

The newest newsletter was posted today, and the features include a Summer Exercise Spotlight, as well as great monthly features such as the Cooking Corner and Everyday Answers.

Sign up for our monthly newsletters today, or have a look at our extensive archives: DSIB Healthnotes Update.

Have a lovely 4th of July.

With the shifting of the seasons, Vitamin D supplementation sometimes gets a little lost in all the sunshine. Sunlight is key to natural vitamin D synthesis in the body, and so with the onset of summer, we tend to hear less and less about vitamin D.

With this in mind, we would like to direct your attention a recent study regarding vitamin D, lest it fly under the radar and go unnoticed in the fine weather.

Researchers at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York and the Norwegian Institute for Air Research in Tromsø have just reported findings that vitamin D levels are best achieved through supplements, due to the risks associated with UV exposure. From the study's conclusions:

Although it may be tempting to recommend intentional sun exposure based on our findings, it is difficult, if not impossible to titrate one's exposure. There are well-known detrimental side effects of ultraviolet irradiation. Therefore, oral supplementation remains the safest way for increasing vitamin D status.

Be careful out there in the sun! And please take a moment to read up further on vitamin D and sun-safe health:

DSIB: Vitamin D

Journal of American Academy of Dermatology

According to British doctors, children who are spending excessive amounts of time using the internet may be at risk for developing rickets due to vitamin D deficiency.

In a review in the latest issue of the British Medical Journal, Newcastle University researchers stated that as a younger generation spends more of its leisure time indoors, vitamin D levels drop, exposing the population to greater risk for the disease, and a rise in its occurrance, which had been all but ended in modern times. Not long ago, rickets was a condition associated with extreme poverty and starvation — not the affluence of the modern industrialized societies.

The authors of the study suggested "fresh air", adding new regulations to fortify milk products in the UK, and/or other dietary supplementation.

DSIB: Vitamin D

British Medical Journal: Diagnosis and management of vitamin D deficiency

BBC: Newcastle University experts want Vitamin D put in food

Guardian UK: Rickets warning from doctors as vitamin D deficiency widens

Times Online: TV and computer games blamed for return of rickets

Press Association: Rickets rise for inactive children

In a dispatch from Honduras, Nicholas Kristof has written a very interesting op-ed about micronutrients. By turns enlightening and horrific, Kristof's account focuses to readers' attention on the simple preventative measures which can be taken to eliminate a host of birth defects which plague developing nations. This very issue has been mentioned on the DSIB blog before, but this particular article is one of the more powerful examples we have encountered in coming from a major news source. From the NYTimes article:

“In the early stages of life, the die is cast,” said David Dodson, the founder of Project Healthy Children, an aid group that fights micronutrient deficiencies in Honduras and other poor countries. “If a child is not getting the right micronutrients, the effect is permanent.”

“I had never seen anything in my life that could have so much impact for so little money and be sustainable,” Mr. Dodson said

Please have a look at the full article, "World's Healthiest Food, and take a moment to learn more about the micronutrients discussed below.

DSIB: Iodine
DSIB: Iron
DSIB: Vitamin A
DSIB: Vitamin B-Complex
DSIB: Zinc