Good, varied nutrition is important, but Vitamin D is essential for bone health and muscle development. In the UK, our clocks have changed recently to go forward one hour: British Summer Time (BST).
British Summer Time (BST) is the UK’s daylight saving system, shifting clocks one hour ahead of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) from the last Sunday in March to the last Sunday in October (UTC+1). It offers longer, lighter evenings during spring and summer, reverting to GMT in autumn.
Vitamin D functions
It helps regulate the amount of calcium and phosphate in the body.
These nutrients are needed to keep bones, teeth and muscles healthy.
A lack of vitamin D can lead to bone deformities such as rickets in children, and bone pain caused by a condition called osteomalacia in adults.
Good sources
From about late March or early April to the end of September, most people should be able to make all the vitamin D they need from sunlight.
The body creates vitamin D from direct sunlight on the skin when outdoors.
But between October and early March we do not make enough vitamin D from sunlight.
Vitamin D is also found in a small number of foods.
Sources include:
- oily fish – such as salmon, sardines, trout, herring or mackerel
- red meat
- egg yolks
- fortified foods – such as some fat spreads and breakfast cereals
- liver (avoid liver if you’re pregnant – find out about foods to avoid in pregnancy)
People at risk of deficiency
Some people will not make enough vitamin D from sunlight because they have very little or no sunshine exposure.
The Department of Health and Social Care recommends that adults and children over 4 take a daily supplement containing 10 micrograms throughout the year if they:
- are not often outdoors – for example, if they’re frail or housebound
- are in an institution like a care home
- usually wear clothes that cover up most of their skin when outdoors
If you have dark skin – for example you have an African, African-Caribbean or south Asian background – you may also not make enough vitamin D from sunlight.
You should consider taking a daily supplement containing 10 micrograms of vitamin D throughout the year.
Exercise boosts Vitamin D
Regular exercise in winter can help keep levels up, a new study has found.
More than one in 10 adults in the UK, external, is thought to be lacking in the sunshine vitamin, which is needed to keep muscles and bones healthy.
The study, co-ordinated by the University of Bath, University of Cambridge and University of Birmingham, found that overweight and obese adults who took part in a 10-week indoor exercise programme had “significantly smaller drops” in levels than those who did not exercise.
Lead author Dr Oly Perkin, from the University of Bath, said: “This is the first study to show that exercise alone can protect against the winter dip in vitamin D.”
The benefits of exercise are not in doubt. Home gym gear helps you with strength training, cardio and flexibility.
