How Much Vitamin D Do We Need, and How Should We Get it?

Vitamin D is an essential nutrient for maintaining strong bones, helping muscular function, building immunity, and allowing the brain to communicate with the body through the nervous system. It can be obtained through sun exposure, certain foods, and dietary supplements. Getting an adequate supply of vitamin D, though, can be tricky – it is important to avoid a deficiency without overcorrecting to the point of toxicity.  

What is Vitamin D?

• What is vitamin D and why does the body need it? (MedicalNewsToday – February 5, 2024)
• Vitamin D Benefits (Healthline – February 6, 2023)
• 8 Ways Vitamin D Can Potentially Benefit Your Health (Everyday Health – September 2, 2022)
• What’s the Deal with Vitamin D? (Columbia University Irving Medical Center – August 24, 2022)
• What Is Vitamin D? (Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics – March 11, 2022)
• Vitamin D and your health: Breaking old rules, raising new hopes (Harvard Health Publishing – September 13, 2021)
• Vitamin D and health – The missing vitamin in humans (Pediatrics and Neonatology – June 2019)
• Vitamin D Myths ‘D’-bunked (Yale Medicine – March 15, 2018)
• Vitamin D: a critical and essential micronutrient for human health (Frontiers in Physiology – July 10, 2014)
• Vitamin D: The “sunshine” vitamin (Journal of Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapeutics – April – June 2012)
• Vitamin D (Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health)
• Vitamin D (International Osteoporosis Foundation)
• Vitamin D (Mayo Clinic)
• Vitamin D (Medline Plus)
• Vitamin D (Nemours Kids Health)
• Vitamin D and Calcium (Johns Hopkins Medicine)
• Vitamin D Fact Sheet for Consumers (National Institutes of Health)
• Vitamin D Fact Sheet for Health Professionals (National Institutes of Health)
• Vitamin D – Uses, Side Effects, and More (WebMD)

How Much Vitamin D Do We Need?

• How to Get Enough Vitamin D (National Geographic – September 22, 2023)
• How Much Vitamin D Should You Take For Optimal Health? (Healthline – June 23, 2023)
• Controversies in Vitamin D: A Statement From the Third International Conference (JBMR Plus – December 1, 2020)
• Immunologic Effects of Vitamin D on Human Health and Disease (Nutrients – July 15, 2020)
• Nutrigenomics of Vitamin D (Nutrients – March 21, 2019)
• The concept of the personal vitamin D response index (The Journal of Steroid Biochemistry and Molecular Biology – January 2018)
• Comparative analysis of nutritional guidelines for vitamin D (Nature Reviews Endocrinology – April 7, 2017)
• What is the optimal vitamin D status for health? (Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology – September 2006)
• The vitamin D questions: How much do you need and how should you get it? (Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology – February 2006)
• How much vitamin D do people need? (National Cancer Institute)

Deficiency

• Vitamin D Deficiency (WebMD – November 15, 2022)
• Vitamin D Deficiency and Related Disorders (Medscape – September 8, 2022)
• Vitamin D deficiency and insufficiency in Hawaii: Levels and sources of serum vitamin D in older adults (American Journal of Human Biology – July 2, 2021)
• Vitamin D for skeletal and non-skeletal health: What we should know (Journal of Clinical Orthopaedics and Trauma – November-December 2019)
• Vitamin D Deficiency: Defining, Prevalence, Causes, and Strategies of Addressing (Calcified Tissue International – May 8, 2019)
• Vitamin D deficiency in childhood: old lessons and current challenges (Journal of Pediatric Endocrinology and Metabolism – February 5, 2018)
• The vitamin D deficiency pandemic: Approaches for diagnosis, treatment and prevention (Reviews in Endocrine and Metabolic Disorders – May 17, 2017)
• Vitamin D deficiency as a public health issue: using vitamin D2 or vitamin D3 in future fortification strategies (Proceedings of the Nutrition Society – March 28, 2017)
• Vitamin D Deficiency (Cleveland Clinic)
• Vitamin D Deficiency (Medline Plus)
• Vitamin D Deficiency (YaleMedicine)

Toxicity

• Vitamin D Toxicity from an Unusual and Unexpected Source: A Report of 2 Cases (Hormone Research in Paediatrics – June 13, 2023)
• Practices of vitamin D supplementation leading to vitamin D toxicity: Experience from a Low-Middle Income Country (Annals of Medicine and Surgery – January 2022)
• Vitamin D Toxicity (Brazilian Journal of Nephrology – April-June 2020)
• Vitamin D Toxicity–A Clinical Perspective (Frontiers in Endocrinology – September 19, 2018)
• Development of Vitamin D Toxicity from Overcorrection of Vitamin D Deficiency: A Review of Case Reports (Nutrients – July 24, 2018)
• A review of the growing risk of vitamin D toxicity from inappropriate practice (British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology – March 2, 2018)
• Chapter 82 – Hypercalcemia Due to Vitamin D Toxicity (Vitamin D (Fourth Edition) – 2018)
• Vitamin D toxicity resulting from overzealous correction of vitamin D deficiency (Clinical Endocrinology – June 6, 2015)
• What is vitamin D toxicity? Should I be worried about taking supplements? (Mayo Clinic)

How Should We Get Vitamin D?
Natural Sources

• What Are Good Sources of Vitamin D? (Health – February 9, 2024)
• Chapter 3 – Photobiology of vitamin D (Feldman and Pike’s Vitamin D – Fifth Edition – 2024)
• Top Foods Rich in Vitamin D (Verywell Health – October 12, 2023)
• 7 Nutritious Foods That Are High in Vitamin D (Healthline – July 6, 2023)
• 12 Foods That Are Good Sources of Vitamin D (Health – May 10, 2023)
• Benefits and Risks of Sun Exposure to Maintain Adequate Vitamin D Levels (Cureus – May 5, 2023)
• Foods High in Vitamin D3 (WebMD – November 24, 2022)
• Foods High in Vitamin D (WebMD – August 17, 2022)
• Vitamin D from Vegetable VV Sources: Hope for the Future (Phytomedicine Plus – May 2022)
• Sources of vitamin D for humans (Vitamin and Nutrition Research – October 18, 2021)
• Vitamin D, the natural way (Clinical Nutrition ESPEN – February 2021)
• How to get more vitamin D from the sun (MedicalNewsToday – January 22, 2021)
• Food Sources of Vitamin D (Dietary Guidelines for Americans – 2019)
• Ask the Doctors – How much sunshine do I need for enough vitamin D? (UCLA Health – March 23, 2018)
• Sunlight and Vitamin D: Necessary for Public Health (Journal of the American College of Nutrition – June 22, 2015)
• Which foods are high in vitamin D? (British Heart Foundation)

Supplements

• Vitamin D: sources, physiological role, biokinetics, deficiency, therapeutic use, toxicity, and overview of analytical methods for detection of vitamin D and its metabolites (Critical Reviews in Clinical Laboratory Sciences – May 16, 2022)
• The health effects of vitamin D supplementation: evidence from human studies (Nature Reviews Endocrinology – November 23, 2021)
• Calcium and/or Vitamin D Supplementation for the Prevention of Fragility Fractures: Who Needs It? (Nutrients – April 7, 2020)
• Association between vitamin D supplementation and mortality: systematic review and meta-analysis (BMJ – August 12, 2019)
• Vitamin D Supplementation Guidelines for General Population and Groups at Risk of Vitamin D Deficiency in Poland—Recommendations of the Polish Society of Pediatric Endocrinology and Diabetes and the Expert Panel With Participation of National Specialist Consultants and Representatives of Scientific Societies—2018 Update (Frontiers in Endocrinology – May 30, 2018)
• Emerging Evidence of Thresholds for Beneficial Effects from Vitamin D Supplementation (Nutrients – May 3, 2018)
• Vitamin D supplementation guidelines (The Journal of Steroid Biochemistry and Molecular Biology – January 2018)
• Vitamin D supplementation (Practical Neurology – September 25, 2017)
• Vitamin D: dietary requirements and food fortification as a means of helping achieve adequate vitamin D status (The Journal of Steroid Biochemistry and Molecular Biology – April 2015)