According to Mayo Clinic, your body needs Vitamin D for building and maintaining healthy bones. That’s because your body can only absorb calcium, the primary component of bone when vitamin D is present. Vitamin D also regulates many other cellular functions in your body. Its anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, and neuroprotective properties support immune health, muscle function, and brain cell activity.
Vitamin D insufficiency affects almost 50% of the population worldwide. An estimated 1 billion people worldwide, across all ethnicities and age groups, have a vitamin D deficiency (VDD).
Vitamin D isn’t naturally found in many foods, but you can get it from fortified milk, fortified cereal, and fatty fish such as salmon, mackerel, and sardines. Your body also makes vitamin D when direct sunlight converts a chemical in your skin into an active form of the vitamin (calciferol).
The amount of vitamin D your skin makes depends on many factors, including the time of day, season, latitude, and skin pigmentation. Depending on where you live and your lifestyle, vitamin D production might decrease or be completely absent during the winter months. Sunscreen, while important to prevent skin cancer, also can decrease vitamin D production.
Many older adults don’t get regular exposure to sunlight and have trouble absorbing vitamin D. If your doctor suspects you’re not getting enough vitamin D, a simple blood test can check the levels of this vitamin in your blood.
Taking a multivitamin with vitamin D may help improve bone health. The recommended daily amount of vitamin D is 400 international units (IU) for children up to age 12 months, 600 IU for people ages 1 to 70 years, and 800 IU for people over 70 years.
What is constipation?
Constipation is a condition in which a person has uncomfortable or infrequent bowel movements. Generally, a person is considered to be constipated when bowel movements result in the passage of small amounts of hard, dry stool, usually fewer than three times a week. However, normal stool elimination may consist of having a bowel movement three times a day or three times a week; it depends on the person.
About 4 million people in the United States have frequent constipation. Constipation is the most common gastrointestinal complaint, resulting in 2.5 million doctor visits annually.
Hard, dry stools are the result of the colon absorbing too much water. Normally, as food moves through the colon (also known as the large intestine) the colon absorbs water while forming stool (waste products). Muscle contractions then push the stool toward the rectum, and, by the time the stool reaches the rectum, most of the water has been absorbed, making the stool solid.
When the colon’s muscle contractions are slow or sluggish, the stool moves through the colon too slowly, resulting in too much water being absorbed.
Does vitamin D cause constipation?
Yes, taking vitamin D can cause constipation because increased levels of vitamin D in the body can increase levels of calcium in the blood, and too much calcium often leads to constipation. It takes a variety of nutrients for the proper absorption of calcium, especially magnesium. Magnesium is a natural laxative and thus counterbalances the constipating effects of calcium.
Other side effects of vitamin D include:
- loss of appetite
- weight loss
- nausea
- vomiting
Vitamin may cause other side effects. Call your doctor if you have any unusual problems while taking this vitamin.
If you experience a serious side effect, you or your doctor may send a report to the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) MedWatch Adverse Event Reporting program online (http://www.fda.gov/Safety/MedWatch) or by phone (1-800-332-1088).
