Osteoporosis prevention and bone health for this winter

Building strong bones for prevention of osteoporosis even at young age

Autumn is almost here and with autumn in England the sun ray will be a bit further away, which it means less vitamin D forming for all of us.  All the seasons are wonderful as each brings their own beauty and health. Even though we might eat as healthy as possible though, vitamin D is one of the vitamins that we might all lack at the end of winter if we do not supply ourselves and our children extra in a supplement form. Since the testing of vitamin D around the world, there is an increase awareness of how little vitamin D we get from our food and light in England and countries where the Sunshine is little and short in supply. Most of our vitamin D comes from the sunshine, however I have seen and experienced low vitamin D even in the sunniest countries. That is because vitamin D needs to be activated by the liver and kidneys and if that they do not work properly either genetically or for overload, than we end up with very low bioavailable vitamin D. My suggestion as a Nutritionist is to supply the vitamin D3 from November to April and spend as much time in the sun or outside as possible to get some from the skin. If you are one of the lucky ones that can go away for the winter, than you do not need as much. Darker skins do need more exposure or take the extra supplement as the light in England will not be enough. You can get some vitamin D from oily fish and from dairy and eggs however might not be enough or if you have problems with your intestinal tract and digestion you might not absorb it enough and especially if you are intolerant or allergic to diary and you do not know or you keep having it.

Vitamin D is not the only minerals important for the bones. The obvious other ones are calcium and magnesium, however zinc, boron and K2 (vitamin K2 and in some extend K1 prat of vitamin K family)  are also essential for bone health. Phosphorus as important as calcium, about 80% of phosphorus is found in the skeleton, 14% is found in muscles and body tissue and the remaining is found in body fluids and blood.

• Phosphorous is found in a lot of foods including meat, fish, eggs, milk, nuts cereals, grains chocolate. Unfortunately a lot of the junk foods and drinks also contain a lot of phosphorus and quite often if you have not a good diet with plenty of calcium to balance that out, you might end up with too much phosphorous and little calcium If you eat healthy, than phosphorus is found in meat and dairy and vegetables.
• Zinc is found in pumpkin seeds, oysters and meat;
• Boron is found in fruits, vegetables and legumes, and not so much in meat and fish.
• Vitamin K is found mainly in green leafy vegetables, highest in the endive lettuce and dark green vegetables,

Exercise also is very important for inserting calcium and other minerals into the bones. This is done by getting the old bones out and renewing the bones with the new minerals.

As little as walking at a fast pace is enough to get the calcium in. Any other weight bearing exercise is also great. Swimming is not useful for building bones, but great for keeping fit.

Reference:

Arai H. and Sakuma M. (2015). Bone and Nutrition. Bone and phosphorus intake. Clin Calcium. 25(7):967-72. (abstract)

Uenishi K. (2015). Bone and Nutrition. Calcium intake and bone health. Clin Calcium. 25(7):959-66.

Groff J. L. & Gropper S. S. (1999) 3rd ed. Advanced Nutrition and Human Metabolism. UK Wadsworth.