Vitamin D May Protect Against MS
There is new evidence supporting the idea that vitamin D helps prevent multiple sclerosis, but it is too soon to recommend taking the vitamin to lower your risk, researchers say.
Dec. 19, 2006 -- There is new evidence supporting the idea that vitamin D helps prevent multiple sclerosis, but it is too soon to recommend taking the vitamin to lower your risk, researchers say.
In the first large-scale study to examine the issue, researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health reported a strong association between vitamin D levels within the body and MS risk among whites, but not among blacks and Hispanics.
The study is published in the Dec. 20 issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association.
Senior researcher Alberto Ascherio, MD, DrPH, tells WebMD that roughly half of white Americans and two-thirds of black Americans could be considered to have insufficient levels of vitamin D. Because exposure to sunlight is a major source of the vitamin for most people, vitamin D levels are usually lowest in the wintertime.
"Our findings suggest that vitamin D may have a direct impact on multiple sclerosis risk," Ascherio says. "If we confirm that the vitamin is protective, we could potentially prevent thousands of cases of MS a year in the United States alone."
Some 350,000 new cases of multiple sclerosis are diagnosed in the U.S. annually, and the chronic autoimmune disease is more common among women than men.
In earlier studies, Ascherio and Harvard colleagues reported that women who took multivitamins with at least 400 international units (IU) of vitamin D appeared to have a lower risk of MS than women who did not.
Their newest study involved a study population of more than 7 million members of the U.S. Army and U.S. Navy with blood samples stored in a Department of Defense repository.
Between 1992 and 2004, 257 people were diagnosed with MS. Each case was compared to two people without MS matched for age, race, sex, and dates of blood collection.
Vitamin D May Protect Against MS
There is new evidence supporting the idea that vitamin D helps prevent multiple sclerosis, but it is too soon to recommend taking the vitamin to lower your risk, researchers say.
Dec. 19, 2006 -- There is new evidence supporting the idea that vitamin D helps prevent multiple sclerosis, but it is too soon to recommend taking the vitamin to lower your risk, researchers say.
In the first large-scale study to examine the issue, researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health reported a strong association between vitamin D levels within the body and MS risk among whites, but not among blacks and Hispanics.
The study is published in the Dec. 20 issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association.
Senior researcher Alberto Ascherio, MD, DrPH, tells WebMD that roughly half of white Americans and two-thirds of black Americans could be considered to have insufficient levels of vitamin D. Because exposure to sunlight is a major source of the vitamin for most people, vitamin D levels are usually lowest in the wintertime.
"Our findings suggest that vitamin D may have a direct impact on multiple sclerosis risk," Ascherio says. "If we confirm that the vitamin is protective, we could potentially prevent thousands of cases of MS a year in the United States alone."
Some 350,000 new cases of multiple sclerosis are diagnosed in the U.S. annually, and the chronic autoimmune disease is more common among women than men.
In earlier studies, Ascherio and Harvard colleagues reported that women who took multivitamins with at least 400 international units (IU) of vitamin D appeared to have a lower risk of MS than women who did not.
Their newest study involved a study population of more than 7 million members of the U.S. Army and U.S. Navy with blood samples stored in a Department of Defense repository.
Between 1992 and 2004, 257 people were diagnosed with MS. Each case was compared to two people without MS matched for age, race, sex, and dates of blood collection.