I'm a bit old for this

[Sportsman]

A little while back I noticed a lump where a rib joins the breastbone. It wasn't painful and just felt like hard bone. Finally got around to showing the Dr the other day and he ordered a chest X ray and in the meantime did some blood tests.

It seems that I am seriously deficient in vitamin D to the point where I actually have rickets

Now this is a condition that I have always associated with childhood poverty, neither condition applicable to me, so it came as a bit of a surprise.

Vit D is mainly manufactured in the skin from exposure to sunlight. Other sources are oily fish and offal.

The problem is I don't go out in sunlight very much. Trips tend to be house-car-shop-car-house and if I spend anytime outside I am usually fully clothed and/or sitting in the shade. Another factor may be my age.

I do like liver now and again and eat some oily fish but to get enough Vit D from these sources it would have to be much much more. the only milk I drink is in tea and coffee.

After reading about it it seems that rickets is making a comeback in a generation who just don't go out.

Who'd a thunk it.

[captain cojones]

Hope you get sorted soon, i think the increased publicity about skin cancer nowadays will rightly cause many people to keep covered up.But obviously in some cases too much so!

 

I like the sun, and we have over 300 days a year here, so a shortage of vitamin D hopefully wont be a problem!.

[robtherake]

Who'd have thought it, eh? Like something from another era! What's the prognosis? Is it a simple reversal once your vitamin levels are re-balanced? I wonder if it's contributed to any other little niggles you may have had.

Best wishes, anyhow.

[Sportsman]

Thanks Rob

I have started on heavy duty Vit D replacement (100,000-iu today) and hopefully that will reverse it. It may also account for some of the other niggles as well. Here's hoping.

By all accounts Vit D deficiency is a lot more common than most would think. I blame it on 20 years in the Scottish highlands.

[Little Roachess]

This has certainly given me food for thought. I wonder also if it is down to the fact that there isn't much sun in the UK to get sufficient numbers of VitD???? For instance, when was the last burst of decent sunshine? mmmm. Can't you get a supplement from some health food store? Will this not help you? GWS.

[Phone]

Sportsman,

 

I thought that's why we called you Limeys.

 

Ohh wait, wrong vitamin. Most of our vitD comes as fortified foods (I think?).

 

VitD comes from the irradiation of cholesterol - one of your favorite subjects.

 

Phone

(I too hope you get on well)

[Sportsman]

Sportsman,

 

I thought that's why we called you Limeys.

 

Ohh wait, wrong vitamin. Most of our vitD comes as fortified foods (I think?).

 

VitD comes from the irradiation of cholesterol - one of your favorite subjects.

 

Phone

(I too hope you get on well)

 

No shortage of cholesterol so it must be a shortage of sunshine.

Looks like I didn't move far enough South