Maintaining a healthy diet and lifestyle can be a challenge at the best of times. Getting outside to stay active, enjoy rare glimpses of winter sunshine, and get your daily dose of vitamin D isn’t always possible when times are hectic.
Many people suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder (or ‘the winter blues’), which can result in low energy, feeling gloomy and unmotivated to eat healthy foods.
The NHS recommends taking a vitamin D supplement in the wintertime to boost vitamin D levels during the months when there’s less sunlight. [1]
But we actually recommend supplementing your diet with vitamin D3 and vitamin K2, a combination that offers a holistic boost to your everyday life and overall health.
Here’s what the science says about this stellar combination.
Better Together: Vitamin D3 and K2 Maximise Absorption
The combination of vitamin D3 and K2 has gained scientific and public attention recently due to their complementary effects. There has been an increase in promising research on the synergistic effect of combining these two vitamins in everyday supplements. [2]
You might say these two vitamins have a ‘Batman and Robin’ effect: they’re good on their own, but even better together.
Both vitamins are fat-soluble and work together to metabolise calcium in your body by activating helpful proteins [3]. While vitamin D3 improves your calcium absorption [4], vitamin K2 allocates where that calcium can be used.
When you aren’t getting enough calcium from your diet or supplementation, vitamin D may get the calcium it needs from your bones [5]. So in order to prevent the bones from weakening, vitamin K2 helps promote the calcification of your bones while regulating [6] and reducing [7] the damaging effect of the calcification and hardening of soft tissues (such as blood vessel walls or around the major organs).
There is some evidence to suggest that taking the two vitamins together may help reduce the risk of developing conditions such as osteoporosis, or other chronic diseases like kidney or heart disease, though more research is needed in this area. [8]
This is why we have combined these two vitamins in our LLS Vitamin D3 + K2 supplement.
The importance of fatty meats and vegetables
In the UK, a National Diet and Nutrition Survey showed that people consume too much salt, sugar, and saturated fat, while not eating enough fruit and vegetables. In the survey, only 30% of adults said they consumed their 5-a-day. [9]
This has huge implications for the average person’s consumption of essential nutrients, such as our dynamic duo, vitamin D3 and K2.
Vitamin D is found abundantly in fish oil, fatty fish, red meat, egg yolks, and liver. As winter days get shorter, it’s important to make sure you’re getting enough vitamin D.
In the short term, this may help prevent ‘the winter blues’ (also known as Seasonal Affective Disorder). In the long term, it may help reduce the risk of developing bone-related health issues or other chronic diseases later in life. [10]
Vitamin K is most commonly found in animal source foods, some fermented foods, and also dark, leafy-green vegetables.
Studies have shown that you need a relatively high intake of vitamin K to support a healthy vascular system and bones. [11]
So, if you’re a vegetarian, or if you eat meat and don’t include many vegetables in your diet, you might want to consider taking a vitamin K2 supplement.
If you mainly eat lean meats and low fat foods - because these are often promoted as being the ‘healthy option’ - you may actually be limiting your vitamin K intake. Vitamin K (along with vitamins A, D and E) is a fat-soluble vitamin, which means the body absorbs it more easily in the presence of dietary fat.
So if you’re not a vegetarian, it’s best not to cut animal fats out of your diet completely.
MCT (medium-chain triglycerides) powder can aid the absorption of fat soluble vitamins, especially when taken with food [12], which is why we include MCT Powder in our Vitamin D3/K2 supplement.
Take Vitamin D3 and K2 for Bone Health...
Taken together, vitamin D3 and K2 may help increase bone mineral density and strengthen the bones, which is helpful for people at risk of bone fractures, such as the elderly population. [13]
In a study, researchers also found that vitamin K supplements helped post-menopausal women maintain healthy bones. [14] Women in the study took the supplements for 3 years and saw positive effects for age-related bone deterioration and spine collapse.
...and Cardiovascular Health
We recommend choosing a vitamin K2 supplement over K1. Studies have shown that blood vessels absorb and use vitamin K2 over K1 when available. [15]
Vitamin K2 activates proteins in your blood that prevent the calcification of blood vessels - where mineral deposits build up on the walls of a person’s blood vessels.
The calcification or hardening of blood vessels is relatively common, [16] and can lead to life-threatening complications, such as heart attacks, strokes, dementia, and loss of blood supply to parts of your body. Vitamin K deficiency may therefore increase the risk of these complications - and a supplement may help prevent them.
Staying Healthy During Flu Season
During the flu season, vitamin D can be particularly effective at reducing the risk of illness. A recent study has suggested that vitamin D can help lower your risk of falling ill with the flu and acute respiratory illnesses. The researchers recommend that people in 'at-risk' groups take higher doses of vitamin D as a supplement to increase the concentration of vitamin D in the blood. The researchers also noted that vitamin D supplementation could reduce the risk of infection and death. [17] They recommend taking vitamin K2 along with vitamin D to prevent negative, long term health effects.
Remember that you should always consult your doctor before starting to take a new supplement, particularly if you are being treated for health conditions.
How to choose a vitamin D3 and K2 supplement
When choosing a vitamin K2 supplement, we recommend K2VITAL, which we use in our vitamin D3 and K2 capsules. It’s a highly stable, lab-tested nutrient supplement that will pack a punch even if it sits on the shelf for a year or more.
K2VITAL is the safest form of vitamin K2 on the market. Researchers recognise its superiority over a standard form of vitamin K2, which can lose its stability when it comes into contact with other minerals. [18]
Since these nutrients are fat-soluble, combining vitamin D3 and K2 with MCT, as we do in our supplement, improves nutrient absorption in the body.
RELATED PRODUCTS: Vitamin D3 + K2 Capsules
References
[1] https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/vitamins-and-minerals/vitamin-d/
[2] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5613455/
[3] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5613455/
[4] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24335055/
[5] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK56060/
[7] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11374034/
[8] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4566462/
[10] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5440113/
[11] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17158229/
[13] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5613455/
[14] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00198-013-2325-6
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