Can vitamin D help to combat depression and enhance mood?
Posted on 23 December 2009
Those of us who are now in the depths of winter may be suffering not just from the cold, but the relative lack of light too. Shortened days have the ability to depress the mood and precipitate
Published December 23, 2009 . Filed under: Brain and Behaviour, Nutrients and Supplements, Sunlight
Here’s some purely anecdotal information, but I think it’s persuasive.
I recently moved back to the Pacific Northwest (U.S.). When I lived here previously, I had serious problems with SAD, that were only alleviated by using an intense light specifically designed to deal with that. It worked at the time.
I was concerned that I would have to do the same this time. But a couple of years ago, after reading a lot about Vitamin D, I started taking large amounts, generally 50,000 units/week.
I haven’t been ill in that time, which is interesting. But what I find even more interesting is that I have had no problems with SAD over two winters now, and I’m at a higher latitude than I was the last time I was in this area.
This is persuasive to me, because I had no anticipation of this happening. I had not heard that Vitamin D improved mood and helped SAD until recently, long after the time when I expected to become depressed.
So there ya have it.
December 29, 2009 @ 3:03 am
I am glad to know for sure, patients with severe major depression would have to have baseline 25(OH)D blood levels, be treated with doses of vitamin D adequate to raise their levels to at least 35 ng/mL for several months and be compared to a normal control group treated with placebo. No one has ever published such a study.
December 31, 2009 @ 1:42 pm