Vitamin A & D
- Promotes strong bones and teeth.
- Provides antioxidant protection.
- Helps prevent night blindness.
- Supports immune system function.
- Maintains healthy skin.
- Necessary for calcium absorption.
Vitamin A is a fat-soluble compound that plays an important role
in vision, bone growth, reproduction, cell division, and cell
differentiation (in which a cell becomes part of the brain, muscle, lungs,
etc.). Vitamin A helps regulate the immune system, which helps prevent or
fight off infections by making white blood cells that destroy harmful
bacteria and viruses. Vitamin A also may help lymphocytes, a type of white
blood cell, fight infections more effectively.
Vitamin D is a fat soluble vitamin that is found in food and can
also be made in your body after exposure to ultraviolet (UV) rays from the
sun. The major biologic function of vitamin D is to maintain normal blood
levels of calcium and phosphorus. By promoting calcium absorption, vitamin D
helps to form and maintain strong bones. Vitamin D also works in concert
with a number of other vitamins, minerals, and hormones to promote bone
mineralization. Without vitamin D, bones can become thin, brittle, or
misshapen. Vitamin D sufficiency prevents rickets in children and
osteomalacia in adults, two forms of skeletal diseases that weaken bones.
Research also suggests that vitamin D may help maintain a healthy immune
system and help regulate cell growth and differentiation, the process that
determines what a cell is to become.
|
