Can Vitamin D Help With Weight Loss?

Vitamin D is an essential micronutrient with many essential health benefits such as enhancing the body’s immune system and providing strength to bones. Further, there are also indications that it might assist you in losing weight.

The following article focuses on understanding the impact of vitamin D on weight loss more closely.

What Is Vitamin D?

Vitamin D is a fat-soluble vitamin which can be consumed through foods containing Vitamin D or by supplements. Your body is also able to make it through sun exposure.

Vitamin D helps the body to develop and maintain healthy bones and teeth, has a protective role over the immune system and enables the absorption of calcium and phosphorus.

Since there are not many foods that naturally contain vitamin D, many health care providers suggest obtaining at least 5 to 30 minutes of sunlight exposure daily or consuming vitamin D supplements that offer 600 IU (15 mcg) daily.

But those residing further away from the equator may not be able to receive their necessary amounts of vitamin D through exposure to the sun. If the individual lives in certain latitudes, then it means that the skin will not be able to synthesize any vitamin D for as long as 6 months in a year.

Unfortunately, today nearly half of the world’s population suffers from vitamin D deficiency.

Those at risk of deficiency include:

• Older adults
• Breastfed infants
• Dark-skinned individuals
• Individuals with low exposure to the sun

Another risk factor that causes deficiency is obesity. Notably, there is some proof that if you get enough vitamin D, you will likely shed some pounds.

Overweight People Tend to Have Lower Vitamin D Levels

Current literature indicates that more overweight and obese individuals have low blood levels of vitamin D. There are now a variety of theories that attempt to explain the connection between low vitamin D status and obesity.

Another group of authors argue that obese people eat less vitamin D containing foods, which explains the connection.

Some argue that behavioral factors contribute that overweight people have less body exposure and could not be synthesizing vitamin D by sunbathing.

Moreover, there are some enzymes required to transform vitamin D into its functional form; the concentration of these enzymes may vary in people with obesity.

Nevertheless, a study was conducted in 2012 and found out that if vitamin D level of the obese individuals is standardized by the size, there is actually no difference of levels in obese and non-obese individuals.

This suggests that the requirement for vitamin D varies with body size; for example, obese persons require higher doses than the non-obese for the required blood level to be achieved. This could help explain why obese people are more likely to be deficient in this trace element than normal individuals.

In theory, when your body size is small, then you would need less vitamin D for your body to function efficiently. However, since the amount of it in your body stays constant when you get lighter and leaner, your levels would actually rise. And the level of weight loss may determine the manner in which its levels rise or fluctuate.

Another study assumed that a minor weight reduction raised blood vitamin D levels slightly.

Additionally, participants who had a weight loss of 15% and above had relative increases that were more than three times those of participants who had a 5–10% weight loss.

Further, studies suggest that raising the level of vitamin D in the bloodstream can help cut body fat and aid weight loss.

Higher Vitamin D Levels May Aid Weight Loss

It is claimed that the intake of the vitamin D could increase the weight loss as well as decrease body fat.

The minimum blood level necessary to ensure good bones and overall health is at least 20 ng/mL (50 nmol/L).

In one study 218 overweight and obese women were followed for a year. All underwent caloric restriction and exercise training. The women were split into two groups; the first one was given a vitamin D supplement and the second group was given a placebo.

Overall, the researchers concluded that women, who obtained their daily requirement of vitamin D, lost more weight by about 7 pounds (3.2 kg) than the women who had little or no vitamin D in their blood stream.

One study gave vitamin D supplements to overweight and obese women for 12 weeks. After the completion of the study, the women did not lose any weight, but found that with the increase in the level of vitamin D, body fat reduced.

It is also possible to note that vitamin D may reduce the amount of weight gained.

Another research done on 4,632 elderly women showed significant relationship between higher vitamin D levels in the blood and reduced weight gain between visits over the course of the study period of 4.5 years.

In other words, the consumption of vitamin D can help support weight loss even if more research still needs to be conducted.

How Does Vitamin D Aid Weight Loss?

A number of theories exist in an attempt to explain how vitamin D influences weight loss. Several researches suggest that Vitamin D could help in preventing future development of fat cells within the body.

It could also slow down fat cell storage thereby decreasing fat deposits.

Also, vitamin D helps boost serotonin – the hormone that is involved in everything starting from your mood to your sleep cycle.

Serotonin has also been found to help regulate your appetite and to easily help you gain the feeling of fullness, thus helping to lose body weight and intake less calories.

Last, increased concentration of vitamin D may cause increased concentration of testosterone thus resulting to weight loss.

A cross sectional study conducted in 2011 administered 165 male participants with vitamin D supplements or placebo for one year. In this study, it revealed that the people who took the supplements saw their testosterone levels rise more significantly than a placebo group.

It has been found in various researches that increased concentration of testosterone decreases adiposity and supports long term weight loss.

It achieves this by increasing your metabolic rate which in turn means that your system will burn more calories after taking your meals. It could also help to prevent further production of new fat cells in the body.

How Much Do You Need Vitamin D?

The dietary amount of vitamin D that has been advised for the adults of 19–70 years age group is 600 IU or 15 mcg per day.

Still, the intake of vitamin D may not be quite as simple as it seems since research was done showing that the daily intake should change depending on the weight of the body.

In one of the studies, an attempt was made to estimate the dose based on body weight and adjusting for vitamin D concentrations, and this showed that 32–36IU per pound or 70–80IU/kg is sufficient.

This amount could be way over the recommended upper limit of 4,000 IU per day depending on the individual’s body weight.

At the same time, daily intake of doses up to 10,000 IU have been described with no side effects.

However, vitamin D supplements are toxic when consumed in large quantities. It would be advisable to seek your doctor’s advice before going over the daily recommended limit of 4,000 IU.

Ways to Increase Your Vitamin D Levels

While searching for the relationship between vitamin D and weight loss, scientists prefer to use supplements in their experiments, not people’s exposure to the sun or food.

That’s because pills are standardised and can be used in large doses to quickly increase the vitamin D level in a study participant. For instance, a cross-sectional research conducted in July 2018 in International Journal of Preventive Medicine administered subjects with weighed or obesity 50,000 IU of vitamin D per week for 6 weeks which is beyond the doses that may cause toxicity, 4,000 IU a day or 28,000 IU per week, according to the NIH. 

In this small study, researchers documented that the subjects’ weight, BMI, waist circumference and hip circumference all diminished while their vitamin D levels rose considerably after consuming this high vitamin D supplement schedule. 

The Bottom Line

Of course, there is a complex relationship between vitamin D status and weight. Sufficient amount of vitamin D is good for controlling hormone levels that might help in supporting the weight loss and reducing the fat mass.

Consequently, fat loss can improve vitamin D and allow you to get the most out of all of its positive effects on your body, including maintaining proper bone density and preventing diseases.

If you live in a place where you are exposed to the sun rarely or you are likely to develop deficiency, then you should add supplements to your diet.

The intake of vitamin D would also improve your weight status as well as general body health.