50,000 IU Vitamin D a day!!
session at a time is all I can do, multitasking is a fine art that I am still trying to master. 
"When you see only one set of footprints, it was then that I carried you."
Dealing With Vitamin D Deficiency
Newspaper Columns, Pharmacy Q&A November 9, 2007
Q. I've just learned that many people over 50 are vitamin D deficient. My doctor called with my test results: I have about 7 percent of the recommended amount of vitamin D in my body. I've got all the symptoms but attributed them to arthritis and age. For years I've taken a multivitamin and two calcium + 400 units of vitamin D daily, so my low levels came as a surprise. My doctor said he's begun testing all women over 50 for D deficiency. He prescribed 50,000 units of vitamin D to be taken once weekly. Is this much vitamin D dangerous? A. If you were taking that much vitamin D daily, you might well get into the toxic range. Your doctor will be monitoring to make sure your vitamin D levels stabilize with treatment. Research evidence is mounting that 400 international units of vitamin D daily, the currently recommended intake, is inadequate for many people. Vitamin D is essential not only for preventing rickets and building strong bones, but also for a healthy immune system that can fight off infections and cancer.Tags: Arthritis, Cancer, Immune System, Infections, Vitamin D Deficiency
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Reader Comments
The comments below are provided by the users of this site and not by The Peoples Pharmacy or the Graedons. Please also remember that nothing contained in this site is intended as a substitute for medical advice.1 cup of milk is supposed to provide 25% of required vitamin D. I have at least two.
If you regularly (daily) include milk and milk products (and multi-vitamin tablets) in your diet, work out in the yard, and enjoy some tanning sessions in the sun in summer, what's the problem?
I am 60 years old and feel great. My annual physical shows all elements are within parameters.
I too have a very low level of vitamin D as shown in recent blood tests. I take 1600 units of calcium citrate with added D and magnesium and have been taking supplemental D. I am concerned that my levels remain so low. I am going to increase my supplementation of D to 2000 IU daily. This must be a pretty universal problem! I hope the added dose of D will help me.
My Vitamin D level was low and my doctor put me on a prescription Vit. D pill (which is D2), which I took once a week. I recently checked my Vit D level again, and it was still not adequate (after 3 months on D2).
After reading about Vitamin D, I am now taking an over the counter D3 (cholecalciferol), which appears to be much better and more effective than D2. I am taking 2000 IU daily.
I was not aware that in order to raise Vit. D levels, there is a difference in the D2 and the D3. This is something to consider when supplementing with Vitamin D. I am hopeful that in a couple of months, my Vit. D level will be adequate. I do get out in the sun and eat a healthy diet, but it is still necessary for me to add the Vit. D supplement.
Last winter, my doctor put me on 50,000 units of Vit. D. weekly. My blood level in the beginning was 20, the lower limit. After 3 months, my blood level was up to 50, so my dose was reduced to 50,000 units twice a month. This winter I'll be tested again to see where I am.
My doctor has prescribed for me to take 1000 MG daily. I had a brain hemorrhage when I was about 26, then I have had non-bleeding strokes in 91, 95, 99 & 2003. Each time I had to spend time in the hosp. I have to take dilantin & phenabarbital as I now have secerias because of the original stroke. My doctor said because of these medications for all this time it has caused my problem. What are your thoughts about this?
I'm a woman in my late 40's who has never had any health issues. I recently found out I had osteoporosis (it runs in my family so, against my GP's advice, I took the dexascan just to get a baseline).
I immediately took a Vitamin D test and found out I was deficient, with levels at 18 ng/ml. My doctor put me on a regimen of 50,000 IU of ergocalciferol (D2) per week for 8 weeks. I was retested and my levels had come up to only 24 ng/ml.
I'm disappointed that the results are not more impressive but I'm also encouraged that the levels have increased. I am now considering ordering the 50,000 IU D3 product from a company called BioTech. I am also considering ordering a UVB lamp.
What I am finding is that most general practitioners, however well intentioned, know very little about Vitamin D deficiency and are not quite sure how to treat it.
One thing's for sure--the days of depending on your doctor for the maintenance of your health are long gone. You have to be your own advocate and do your own research. You have to bring the research to your doctor and educate him or her. If you have a good doctor, he or she will appreciate this as mine did.
My doctor just prescribed me Vitamin D 50000IU. I am to only take two pills a week so I have decided to take them on Wednesday and Saturday. I wanted to know if any one has had side effects from taking the medication.
LT is absolutely correct. It is essential that patients become well enough informed to take control of their own health care. My PCP was after me for a while to take statins because my total cholesterol was 220 (HDL>50). I politely declined his offer and began a regimen of plant sterols, Lecithin and fish oil. At my last blood test, total cholesterol was 201 and HDL was 54. The doctor was impressed and no longer tries to have me take statins. As an aside, my mother had total cholesterol of over 300, never had a heart problem and died at 87 of a septic infection from cataract surgery. If the modern prescription drugs are so wonderful, why did so many of our ancestors live to be over 90 without them. RB
Just over a month and a half ago, I was released from the hospital. I have cystic fibrosis, and malabsorption problems. I was made very ill from being given Cipro in the treatment of Cf, and after that could not eat for three weeks. Therefore my blood levals were all down, and by the time I got to the kidney doctor, they told me that my vitamin D was also low.
The doctor called in a perscription of 50,000 units of vitamin D and ordered me to take it once a week, which I did for two weeks on Sunday. Following the second dose on Monday, by that afternoon I noticed I was not urinating right, and made several trips to the bathroom as I could not hold in my bladder. What I found was large amounts of red blood all through the urine, and clots started to form, and it was beginning to get cloudy.
I must have had stones formed by taking magnesium for tummy aches, and now I do not have any appetite at all, temperture at 99.3, and feeling over-all sick in the stomach, but urine is back to normal.
I read that 1500 is the top amount that should be given to prevent deficiencies, but also to take with calcium, which he has not prescribed. Now I wonder if it was the vitamin D which caused the cloudy blood to appear in my urine, and did this cause stones which were very painful to pass?
session at a time is all I can do, multitasking is a fine art that I am still trying to master. 
Imperfect does not = unsuccessful
session at a time is all I can do, multitasking is a fine art that I am still trying to master. 
