At the Physiatry practice of Dr. Perry Herman, we realize the importance of lifestyle modification and the role that good nutrition plays in this for overall health and wellness. While we employ a variety of traditional and alternative medicine remedies to relieve neck and back pain as well as resolve sports injuries, we know that good health is more than just the absence of disease. You want to be at your best in order to get the most out of life and an understanding about the importance of vitamins D3 and K and their relation to calcium and bone health can help you with this.
The Sunshine Vitamin
Vitamin D has long been known as the sunshine vitamin since the body produces it in response to exposure to the sun. Even with the ready availability of sunlight, many people are still deficient in this critical nutrient. The D3 form of vitamin D is best for us since it’s the type that our bodies get from exposure to the sun. It’s important because it helps your body absorb calcium. This is critical because calcium that’s not absorbed can end up in our arteries, which can lead to heart disease. Additionally, it’s helpful in boosting our immune systems overall.
The Little-Known Vitamin K
When most people think about vitamins, the old standbys that come to mind are A, a variety of B vitamins, C, D and E. Vitamin K is used by our bodies in certain biological processes with blood clotting and blood coagulation being a couple of the more important ones. There’s another function it has, however, and that’s to activate proteins that enable our body to properly utilize calcium. Vitamin K consists of K1 and K2 varieties. Both types are beneficial, but K2 helps your body figure out where calcium needs to go to do the most good.
Synergistic Effect of Multiple Nutrients
At our practice, we like to take a holistic approach to helping people, and this entails looking at many factors that affect your health. It’s easy to focus too narrowly on the benefits of one procedure or course of action or nutrient. Sometimes, however, you can achieve added benefit from a combination of nutrients, and vitamins D and K seem to be an excellent example of this.
Basically, vitamin D helps your body absorb calcium, but vitamin K tells your body what to do with it. This makes them essential partners especially with regard to bone health since this is what calcium is known for promoting. Various forms of vitamin K are found in leafy greens, broccoli, Brussels sprouts as well as fish, meat and eggs. Vitamin D3 is found in fatty fish and eggs. If you are lacking in such staples in your diet, you may want to think about taking a supplement that combines these two nutrients.
Here for Your Pain Management and Wellness
Insufficient absorption and utilization of calcium can make for weak bones, which can make painful injury more likely as well as resulting in conditions that negatively affect your health and wellness. If you suffer from a sports injury, neck or back pain, fibromyalgia or other condition or situation that needs relief, you should know that the practice of Dr. Perry Herman is here in Plainsboro, New Jersey to help you. We utilize non-surgical pain treatments for a variety of problems and also create customized lifestyle modification programs for our patients depending on exactly what ails you. We incorporate nutritional advice as much as possible because we know how important this is to your health, wellness and unimpeded function of all your joints.
