Vitamin D Supplements Could Halve Risk Of Serious Asthma Attacks
“Vitamin D significantly reduces severe asthma attacks, when taken along with traditional asthma medication.”
Those were the words of the newsreader this morning.
The new traditional?
Once again the healing power of vitamin D is making headlines. And that’s great news…
However, the words ‘traditional asthma medication’ really grabbed my attention. What kind of ‘traditional’ medication are we talking about?
Are we talking about ginger? Garlic? Mustard Oil? Passionfruit peel?
Fat chance!
Pharmaceutical drugs, like the steroids inhaler prednisolone, seem to be the new ‘traditional’ medicine… at least in the context in which the media is presenting this latest study.
According to the results of a review by the prestigious Cochrane research body, which looked at the outcomes of nine different clinical trials, taking vitamin D supplements in addition to asthma medication appears to cut the risk of severe asthma attacks.
The researchers also found that vitamin D can help cut the rate of asthma sufferers needing steroid treatment.
The Cochrane review’s lead researcher, Professor Adrian Martineau, said vitamin D “significantly reduced the risk of severe asthma attacks, without causing side effects”.
He added that taking vitamin D on a regular basis reduced the risk of asthma sufferers requiring a hospital admission or a visit to A&E from 6 per cent to 3 per cent.
The researchers also found the rate of asthma attack sufferers needing steroid treatment dropped from 0.44 to 0.28 attacks per person per year.
The daily dose of vitamin D used in the study was between 25 to 50 micrograms, which is much higher than the government recommendation of 10 micrograms per day… and according to many alternative health practitioners the dosage used in the study is at the lower end of the scale when it comes to the therapeutic benefits of vitamin D.
The findings of the Cochrane review come shortly on the heels of researchers who recently reported on the trial results for a drug that cuts asthma attacks in patients with the most severe form of the disease.
Two trials in more than 2,500 people showed that a year’s course of benralizumab injections reduced asthma attacks from a third to a half, according to The Lancet.
Benralizumab is part of a group of drugs called IL-5 inhibitors that have common side effects like headache, back pain, fatigue, flu symptoms, urinary tract infection (UTI), abdominal pain, itching, eczema, and muscle spasms…
Whereas truly ‘traditional’ medicines like vitamin D have no side effects.
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Sources:
Vitamin D supplements could halve risk of serious asthma attacks, published online 06.09.2016, theguardian.com
Vitamin D ‘significantly reduces severe asthma attacks’, published online, 06.09.16, bbc.co.uk/
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