For Strengthening the Heart, Vitamin D Gets an A+!

For people with weak heart muscles, there’s D-lightful news about the sunshine vitamin.

There’s no doubt that vitamin D is involved in your good health, and a large body of research links low levels with heart disease, along with certain types of cancer and a host of other conditions. But whether supplementing with vitamin D can help to prevent or treat those conditions remains murky.

A new, five-year study put vitamin D supplements to the test among people with chronic heart-muscle weakness, a condition known as heart failure, which affects more than 5 million Americans. A daily dose of vitamin D3 was shown to improve heart function by up to 36 percent. If you have been diagnosed with heart failure, talk with your doctor about supplementing with vitamin D, and be sure your diet includes dietary sources such as salmon and a fortified form of either dairy or nut milk.

For everyone, it’s a great time of year to get vitamin D from the sun, but remember that a little goes a long way! Basking sunscreen-free for 10 to 15 minutes, with your arms and legs exposed, is all you need to generate vitamin D. After that, slather on sunscreen to protect your skin from damage that can lead to skin cancer. No need to swap one problem for another!