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Non-white skinned people: sunlight may not be enough to increase your vitamin D. https://www.google.com/search?q=dark+skin+vitamin+d+minutes https://www.google
by asah 6y ago
Non-white skinned people: sunlight may not be enough to increase your vitamin D.
https://www.google.com/search?q=dark+skin+vitamin+d+minutes https://www.google.com/search?q=dark+skin+vitamin+d+minutes
- AnonC 6y agoA non-tracking search link with DuckDuckGo: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=dark+skin+vitamin+d+minutes https://duckduckgo.com/?q=dark+skin+vitamin+d+minutes
- gnur 6y agoActually, even lighter skinned people can have lots of trouble generating sufficient vitamin D. My wife's family has the lightest skin possible but they all have vitamin D deficiency, if you have some kind of fatigue it is truly worth having your vitamin levels checked!
- DoofusOfDeath 6y agoIf they're that fair-skinned, is it possible that they're so careful about sunburn/cancer that they're getting less UV than most people?
- serf 6y agoPale complexion / skin can also be a symptom of anemia, and certain types of anemia are implicated/related to vitamin D deficiency. In such cases, both conditions may required supplementation to correct. So, fair to say that it can get complicated.
- Brakenshire 6y agoEven white skinned people who spend long times outdoors may not get enough Vitamin D, especially if you live somewhere northern.
- kyleee 6y agoIs there a scientific classification system for evaluating how light vs. dark a person's skin is? I'd like to know how much my relatively darker skin is preventing vit D uptake / creation in the body
- philsnow 6y agoThere is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitzpatrick_scale https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitzpatrick_scale which I learned about from the apple health app, no idea how widespread it is or how useful it is as a model.
- briankelly 6y agoI learned about this from a dermatologist who specializes in skin cancer care. He says it is a very strong indicator for skin damage and cancer risk (sounded stronger than genetic/family history factors), but how it relates to vitamin D deficiency was not really in his domain.
- kyleee 6y agoThank you
- jmnicolas 6y agoI don't think skin color is very relevant if you live a modern sedentary life that implies most of your time is spent inside: you're probably deficient whatever your skin color is. IMHO it would be best to test your vitamin D level anyway and act accordingly.
- MayeulC 6y agoI think skin color is most likely correlated, without being the cause. Populations with lighter skin colors tend to live at higher lattitudes, where there is less sun. Inherited genes probably compensate for this, while also transmitting the paler/darker skin allele.
- mr_toad 6y ago
- erentz 6y agoGreater than 70% of African Americans are suspected to be Vit D deficient. Definitely worth getting tested if you can [1] especially if you live in the more northern latitudes. Doubly so during winter. [1] with the note that generally insurance is a real PITA with vitamin D testing. The trick usually is to list as a diagnosis code a previous history of low vitamin D. Yes it’s like a catch 22. You need prior testing showing low Vit D to get testing to show low Vit D. Given the huge prevalence of low vitamin D (70+%) amongst African Americans this is maybe a classic example of a dysfunctional health system. A vitamin D supplement is a dirt cheap public health intervention with potentially big pay offs across such a large segment of the population.
- ghaff 6y ago>generally insurance is a real PITA with vitamin D testing FWIW, vitamin D has been among the things tested when I have my blood work for an annual physical and never had any insurance issue about it. And I do take supplements because it was low.
- mypalmike 6y agoInteresting. I had to pay something like $100 out of pocket for my recent vitamin D test (unsurprisingly it was low).
- erentz 6y agoI suspect his doctor just knew to code it properly as low vitamin D for monitoring of replacement therapy. Since he legitimately has low D and is on replacement therapy there’s no issue. For first timers not sure if they are or not an experienced doctor will just label it this way anyway and tell you 9/10 it’ll work. 1/10 you’ll have to pay the fee. It’s just another example of our nonsensical health system at work.
- ghaff 6y agoI really have no idea although I'm very skeptical that my former primary care doctor would have done anything more sophisticated than checking a bunch of boxes on the blood work sheet and faxed it to the hospital lab. It certainly wasn't in response to any symptoms about anything; it just came in low in the lab results at some point. Of course, may be a function of particular insurance provider policies.
- annoyingnoob 6y agoI'm a pale white person and I'm deficient without supplementation. Anyone reading this that spends lots of hours indoors in front of a computer should probably have their vitamin D level checked. Easy to fix with the right amount of supplement, too much is not good either.
- NicolasGorden 6y agoI haven't been tested for Vitamin D deficiency. But... and I'm very easily wrong here, but... wouldn't taking a multi vitamin make this testing unnecessary for the most part? I mean, don't get me wrong, it's always best to test, but diminishing returns and all, wouldn't most people most of the time be fine with just taking one?
- devdas 6y agoNo. Dosage requirement vary by skin colour and latitude.
- UrSuchAGenius 6y agoNon-white? I am white, was deficient and live in the tropics. My doctor recommended me to follow a 400 UI/day regime for 3 months but I raised it to 5000 UI/day for a couple of days and started noticing an interesting change: The 20-year-old flat warts on my hands were gone a week after. Told my doctor but the idiot dismissed the relationship.