Re:Vitamin D, the Sunshine Supplement, Has Shadowy Money Beh...
by semi-extrinsic on Sunday August 19, 2018 @10:10AM
(#17794388)
If a light therapy lamp company claims their product will increase your vitamin D, they're either telling blatant lies, or they're giving you skin cancer. Only UV radiation (like in sunlight and tanning beds) triggers vitamin D production.
[ Parent
| on HN ]
Re:Vitamin D, the Sunshine Supplement, Has Shadowy Money Beh...
by rapsey on Sunday August 19, 2018 @11:13AM
(#17794575)
Yes UVB to be precise. Vitamin d lamps are much narrower spectrum, often even a single wavelength of 311 nm. One popular model is fda approved and proven to be effective. UVA is the problematic wave length spectrum and vitamin d lamps stay clear of it (unlike tanning lamps that are focused on UVA). Exposure is also very short of 3min max.
Re:Vitamin D, the Sunshine Supplement, Has Shadowy Money Beh...
by semi-extrinsic on Sunday August 19, 2018 @11:51AM
(#17794720)
TL;DR: only people with specific diseases should use UVB phototherapy lamps, and in those cases it would be prescribed by a doctor.
UVB exposure does cause cancer, that much is undisputed [1]. However, with very short exposures following a correct schedule given by a doctor, UVB phototherapy can be an efficient treatment for Vitamin D deficiency in people with certain specific illnesses like cystic fibrosis or inflammatory bowel disease that cause digestive malabsorption of vitamins. This can also be an effective treatment e.g. for psoriasis. The increase in risk seems to be negligible when used like this [2], but for people without these specific diseases a normal Vitamin D supplement is unequivocally safer.
[1] https://www.cancer.gov/publications/dictionaries/cancer-term...