Depression and Vitamin D

Adequate vitamin D improves mental state

It is estimated that depression affects more than 300 million people worldwide and that it is the world’s leading cause of disability. Depression is also associated with higher mortality, reduced productivity, and increased direct and indirect healthcare costs. The presence of vitamin D receptors in the brain and its key role in the responses of the immune and nervous systems make it biologically plausible for vitamin D to be associated with brain activity and depression.

Depressive symptoms cause a significant burden worldwide. The therapeutic efficacy of current antidepressants is often insufficient, which is why further ways to alleviate the symptoms of depression have been sought, for example, from nutritional research.

The new meta-analysis on the association of vitamin D supplementation with depression is the largest one published so far, including results from 41 studies from around the world. These studies have investigated the efficacy of vitamin D in alleviating depressive symptoms in adults by randomized placebo-controlled trials in different populations. The studies included those carried out in patients with depression, in the general population, and in people with various physical conditions. The results of the meta-analysis show that vitamin D supplementation is more effective than a placebo in alleviating depressive symptoms in people with depression. There were major differences in the vitamin D doses used, but typically the vitamin D supplement was 50-100 micrograms (2000 - 4000 IU) per day.

So vitamin D seems to alleviate depression in people who already claim to be depressed. While there could be a primary effect of vitamin D on brain chemistry or function related to depression, which Big Pharma will try to isolate and sell back to us at 1000x the cost of vitamin D, a simpler explanation may do until then. To the extent that vitamin D helps relieve the aches and pains of everyday life and prevents sickness by optimizing immune system function maybe having good health is one less thing to be depressed about.

The meta-analysis was carried out in international collaboration between Finnish, Australian and US researchers.

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Journal Reference:

1. Tuomas Mikola, et al. The effect of vitamin D supplementation on depressive symptoms in adults: A systematic review and meta‐analysis of randomized controlled trials. Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition, 2022; 1 DOI: 10.1080/10408398.202