How Do I Maintain my Vitamin D Levels?

by Shake
(Columbus, OH, USA)

I am an active runner and run about 25-30 miles a week. Last year I got stress fractures in my legs, so my doc prescribed 50,000 IU of Vitamin D2 - one table per week for 8 weeks. I got better. But then I stopped the prescription and now after 8-9 months I got stress fractures again but at a different location on the legs. My doc has again prescribed me 50,000 IU of vitamin D2 for 4 weeks and said that after the prescription I could start taking supplements.


My understanding is if D3 is natural occurring and more absorbable by the body(from sunlight etc) then why is my doc recommending D2? Also, D2 needs to be converted to D3 before the body can absorb...so why do doctors recommend D2 and not D3?

Also, can you advice me on how should I keep maintaining my levels once they are back to optimal? I live in Columbus Ohio so not much sunlight in winter.

Thank you for your web-site and all the information on it.

Comments for How Do I Maintain my Vitamin D Levels?

Click here to add your own comments

Because they give prescriptions
by: Kerri Knox, Registered Nurse

Hi Shake,

You are right about D2 verses D3, I discuss this on dozens of pages on my site. Doctors give D2 and not D3 because doctors don't prescribe natural substances. In fact, they can't since prescription drugs cannot BE natural substances. Doctors give prescriptions and prescriptions must be patented drugs, which precludes them from being natural. Are you getting a sens of why our medical system is so flawed?

In any case, simply read my page on Vitamin D Therapy to see why you need vitamin d all year, and why you need magnesium with it, and why you need to get levels done. If your doctor hasn't been doing levels, he's been committing malpractice. You don't prescribe vitamin d based on someone getting fractures, you prescribe it based on being deficient. That is NOT the 'standard of care' to hand out vitamin d based on when someone gets fractures. While that may be suspicion for vitamin d deficiency, the appropriate way to determine if someone needs vitamin d is to get a level. Otherwise, he's just 'guessing' how much you need and the cause of your fractures. Doctors are supposed to be more scientific than guessing, and a vitamin d level is not some high technology that is expensive or he doesn't have access to. It's just a simple and inexpensive blood test that he could have done anytime.

AND if your doctor thought you were deficient, why didn't he give you a maintenance dose? Instead, he sends you out after giving you a loading dose without having you maintain levels? Sounds like your doctor is not thinking, and he's certainly not giving you the 'standard of care' that he should be giving you. He seems extremely neglectful if he failed to both do vitamin d levels and to put you on a maintenance dose after giving you a loading dose to correct low levels.


Kerri Knox, Registered Nurse

Click here to add your own comments

Return to Vitamin D Blood Levels.
Enjoy this page? Please pay it forward. Here's how...

Would you prefer to share this page with others by linking to it?

  1. Click on the HTML link code below.
  2. Copy and paste it, adding a note of your own, into your blog, a Web page, forums, a blog comment, your Facebook account, or anywhere that someone would find this page valuable.

 

Search this Site
Custom Search

 


Vitamin D Fact Sheet
Free Vitamin D Fact Sheet by Getting
My Newsletter