Updated on September 30, 2024.
Studies suggest that if you are at risk for vitamin D deficiency (and many of us are), you may be at greater risk of pain in your muscles and bones. But getting your blood levels back up could help set things right. Here’s what to know about it.
How does vitamin D deficiency affect the body?
Your body needs a variety of vitamins in order to keep everything in good working order.
Vitamin D is important in part because it helps keep a balance of calcium in your bones and blood, and also helps your body use phosphorus. Both calcium and phosphorus are crucial elements of bone health.
If you don’t get enough vitamin D, then you’ll also get less calcium and phosphorus. This can cause issues with your parathyroid glands, which start working harder to try to maintain calcium blood levels. When the body needs calcium, it starts to remove calcium from your bones for use elsewhere in the body. This can cause the bones to soften and puts you at risk of bone fractures. All of this can mean discomfort and pain, too.
Symptoms of vitamin D deficiency are sometimes absent entirely, but other times it’s quite noticeable, though it can still be mistaken for symptoms of other conditions. Since deficiency of vitamin D can cause hypocalcemia (not enough calcium in the blood) and hyperparathyroidism (overactive parathyroid), the symptoms of vitamin D deficiency are really the symptoms of these two conditions. They can cause muscle weakness, muscle aches and cramps, pain in the bones, depression and mood changes, and fatigue. There may also be pins-and-needles sensations in the feet and hands and muscle twitches or tremors.
Vitamin D deficiency hurts
About 1 billion people on the planet have vitamin D deficiency, and 50 percent of the world’s population has vitamin D levels lower than they should be. In the United States, about 24 percent of adults have vitamin D deficiency, of which roughly 6 percent are in the severe deficiency category, according to a 2020 review published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
Not enough vitamin D can make it hard for your body to meet basic needs for your systems to work. This can result in musculoskeletal pain—the muscles and the bones can ache, and the muscles can cramp.
Research has also linked vitamin D deficiency to fibromyalgia syndrome and chronic musculoskeletal pain, according to a 2022 review published in the journal Nutrients. Researchers looked at 14 studies that examined the correlations (links) between vitamin D and chronic pain. While a causal link (evidence that one condition or exposure causes the other) was not shown in this type of review, they did find evidence of two things.
First, people with fibromyalgia syndrome and/or chronic pain often (but not always) have vitamin D deficiency. Secondly, in these cases, treating the pain with vitamin D supplements may lower pain and raise quality of life.
Vitamin D supplements alone are not likely to cure chronic pain, but the evidence so far suggests they may help. If you are experiencing unexplained muscle or bone pain, consider getting your vitamin D levels checked.
Who is at risk of vitamin D deficiency?
Vitamin D can be made by the skin through exposure to sunlight and can also be found in certain foods. While anyone can develop vitamin D deficiency, people who live in areas with dark or long winters can be especially at risk, with little exposed skin to receive sunlight. People with less access to healthy foods and enriched foods may also be at risk.
Some groups are at higher risk as well, including people who are obese, people over age 65, and people with more melanin (darker-skinned). And some medications, medical conditions, and even weight-loss surgeries may cause this deficiency too.
Medications that can lower vitamin D in the body include laxatives, steroids, cholesterol-lowering drugs, and drugs that prevent seizures. Having conditions like celiac disease, kidney disease, and liver disease can also raise the risk of vitamin D deficiency.
Treatments for vitamin D deficiency
If you find out that you’re deficient in vitamin D, eating vitamin-rich foods will probably not be enough to make up for it. After carrying out examinations and tests to rule out underlying health conditions, your healthcare provider (HCP) will likely recommend taking vitamin D supplements while also making sure you’re getting enough calcium in your diet.
Alongside these supplements, your HCP may also encourage you to eat more foods that are rich in vitamin D. These include salmon, tuna, sardines, egg yolks, and fortified foods like milk, orange juice, and breakfast cereals.
Exposure to 15-minute, thrice weekly sessions of sunlight may be an additional treatment recommended by HCPs. However, not every HCP is in favor of it, since sunlight exposure without sunscreen can raise the risk of skin cancer.
More research is needed to confirm the link between vitamin D deficiency and pain, including chronic pain. Still, we already know that getting too little of this essential nutrient may be tied to many of other health problems, including heart disease, osteoporosis and certain kinds of cancer. So, give your health a safety net by getting your vitamin D.
