Why Too Much Vitamin D Can Be A Bad Thing

When you talk about vitamins and supplements, people often get the impression that it’s all right to take as many as one wants. After all, they’re supposedly good for the body, right?

However, studies have shown that this is incorrect. In the case of Vitamin D, specifically, one man ended up damaging his kidneys for taking more than the dose the body needs every day. Overdosing on vitamins can lead to poor health and, in some situations, death.

In a case study published on the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ), a 54-year-old male suffered a kidney injury where his creatinine level reached 376 μmol/L. The normal levels for creatinine in men is 60 to 110 μmol/L. The man had reportedly just returned from a trip to Southeast Asia where he spent hours sunbathing for two weeks.

According to his medical history, he had gout, hypertension and dyslipidemia, for which he was taking other medication daily, such as 10 mg of amlodipine, 10 mg of rosuvastatin, 8 mg of perindopril, 80 mg of febuxostat and 2.5 mg of indapamide.

The study said that while vitamin D toxicity is rare, uninformed patients could be at risk for overdose because supplements and most medications containing it can be easily purchased over the counter. Some symptoms of vitamin D toxicity can include problems with the central nervous system, such as confusion, lethargy and coma.

Other symptoms are polyuria, renal failure, and hypercalcemia. Researchers found that the patient had taken high doses of vitamin D supplements after a naturopath prescribed it, even though he was not vitamin D deficient and had no history of bone problems.

In an interview with WebMD, Lenox Hill Hospital nephrologist Dr. Maria DeVita said that vitamin D is necessary for developing and maintaining strong bones, but too much of it is not good. The extremely high calcium levels in the man’s blood was what triggered the kidney damage.