Healthy Living Tips

Can Vitamin D Fight Aging? New Research Suggests Yes

Can Vitamin D Fight Aging? New Research Suggests Yes

Could vitamin D help add years to your life? Researchers are still working to answer that question, with a new study providing evidence that vitamin D supplements may protect against a key driver of cellular aging and age-related diseases.

Published this month in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, results from a randomized trial involving more than 1,000 adults ages 50 and older showed that daily doses of vitamin D helped preserve telomeres — protective caps at the ends of chromosomes that shorten during aging and are linked to the development of certain diseases.

“In terms of telomere shortening, the effect was similar to saving about three years of aging,” says principal trial investigator JoAnn Manson, MD, MPH, DrPH, professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and chief of the division of preventive medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

Dr. Manson notes that this latest analysis is part of a larger VITamin D and OmegA-3 TriaL (VITAL) trial, which has already shown the benefits of vitamin D in reducing inflammation and lowering risks of certain chronic diseases of aging, such as advanced cancer and autoimmune disease.

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