9 Benefits Of Vitamin D

What Vitamin D Does for Your Body 

Vitamin D is beneficial to your health in many ways, including the nine described below.

​Getting enough vitamin D:

1. Helps strengthen your bones. Vitamin D is crucial for building and strengthening bones since it promotes the absorption of calcium. Together, vitamin D and calcium can prevent osteoporosis and help keep the bones from becoming brittle.
2. Supports the immune system. Vitamin D is important to your immune response. For example, there’s evidence that taking a vitamin D supplement helps reduce the risk of acute respiratory infection in participants.
3. Improves oral health. The effect vitamin D has on bone metabolism is beneficial to oral health, as are its anti-inflammatory properties and ability to stimulate the production of antimicrobial peptides that are part of the immune response. 
4. Helps prevent high blood pressure. Evidence suggests that vitamin D plays an important role in proper blood pressure, including that even a short-term deficit can directly raise blood pressure. 
5. Strengthens muscles. Vitamin D influences muscle development, which is important for everyone but especially older adults, as lack of muscle strength can increase the risk of falling. 
6. Supports weight loss. When combined with calcium, vitamin D has been shown to help with weight loss due to an appetite-suppressing effect.
7. May help reduce the risk of certain cancers. There is increasing evidence that taking a vitamin D supplement can help improve cancer outcomes. This includes experimental evidence that vitamin D has been found to slow or prevent the development of cancer cells and tumors in mice. 
8. May help with depression. Studies have shown a correlation between low vitamin D levels and depression. More research is needed to fully understand the relationship, but already some researchers are advising doctors to screen for vitamin D deficiency in patients with depression since it’s easy to find and address a vitamin deficiency.  
9. May help prevent Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes. Research is ongoing, but studies have found that ensuring the appropriate daily production/intake of vitamin D and calcium could effectively lower diabetes risk. 

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