Will vitamin D increase my kidney stone risk?

Welcome back to the Kidney Stone Diet podcast, the show about reducing your kidney stone risk and living your best life. I'm your host and fellow student, Jeff Sarris.

I'm Jill Harris, your kidney stone prevention nurse. I'm I'm still heated up from the last episode we just recorded.

Yeah, the hoodie came off. You have the V-neck on now. Yeah, I'm having a flash.

There's so much fun merch now, too. I just I always look at the shirts through the camera. I always mean to pick one up, I just have not yet, but I need to.

I'm telling you, I'm really happy with, of course, Dave, who's the third partner in Kidney Stone Diet, he does all our graphic design work and he does the website. I mean, he makes everything beautiful. And, he does such a just a great job.

It's It's, you know, professional-looking despite the fact that I'm wearing it, and just happy, joyful. And, you know, if you have to have a kidney stone,

He did a great job. I love it.

Yeah.

So, we I swear to God, Jeff, he's going to have me wearing freaking colors. The other day I wore the pink one. Not just like I just It made me happy.

Like, all the colors, I was just wearing this one. Like, I don't wear colors like this, and I'm like, "Oh, man." I don't know.

That's fun!

They're making me super happy, yeah.

I mean, that is something worth noting, too. Just like last episode, we like reflected on how we're feeling and if it is making you feel like more positive, that's totally It's like a such a low bar of something. It's like, "Oh, when I wear this color, I feel better." But it's like those little things, when we recognize them, it matters.

It makes It can make a difference.

Look, everything makes a difference. I mean, again, I will always say this, wherever you can find little bips and boops of joy, you go get it. It doesn't have to be a brand new car.

It doesn't have to be anything crazy. Just anywhere you get little bips of joy, wow, it's life-changing, you know? But you have to open your eyes and appreciate things.

You have to be looking for that, right? So,

And, surprisingly, the little things are also sustainable more than, say, a car. It's like you spend the money, you get a car, and you're like, "I have it. Now I drive to the grocery store." Like, it doesn't change anything else.

But like the small things can make a huge impact because they're so consistent over time.

Absolutely.

But, yeah, anyway.

Well, real fast, I just want to say this to viewers, and they're like, "We just want to talk about kidney stones." I know you do. Hold on. So, there was this new study just released, and if you listen to a bird chirping for a few seconds—it's an international study— it will raise your happiness level up to eight hours.

So, I'm just saying, you do, especially in winter in Chicago. I mean, the holidays are over. I still have my tree up.

I'm going to call it a winter tree. I got decorations for it. We're going to change over to a winter tree.

But

Whatever you can do to raise your mind to get a little bit more joy, you typically make better decisions when you're happier, more joyful, you're kinder, you're nicer to yourself, to others. Look, I'm a believer of joy wherever you can get it.

Yeah, absolutely.

Okay, I'm done.

Well, yeah, before we get a Before we don't do another call, we should probably dive right into this one because this is, let's see. We have one from Karen.

Karen.

Hi, this is Karen and I'm from New Whiteland, Indiana. In December of 2018, January 2019, I had a 5 calcium oxalate kidney stone blasted. I have been fine since thanks to you, thanks to Jill.

I am hypothyroid and take 120 112 mcg levothyroxine. My levels are normal. I previously had osteopenia, now have osteoporosis despite taking Vitamin D3 1000 IU, 25 mcg.

My primary care doctor wanted me to take Fosamax, but I really don't want to take that. So he suggested over-the-counter Vitamin D3 at 3,000 IU or 75 mcg. Will this give me kidney stones?

Thank you. Bye.

Karen's voice made my heart happy. I don't know why, it just did. She just sounds nice.

I love you, Karen. Okay, so it's a great question. Vitamin D, and this is another one I get all the time.

So Vitamin D, "My doctor wants me on Vitamin D. I have osteopenia." Now, Karen says she had osteopenia, now it's increased to osteoporosis, so the doctor wants her to take care of that. So Karen's question is, "I am on 1,000 IUs a day of Vitamin D.

He told me to increase it to 3,000 IUs each day. Will this increase my risk for kidney stones?" So, So I'm, because again, I live in Chicago, I'm on 2,000 IUs and I have, normal levels of Vitamin D, and I know that because I get a blood test to make sure every year. Now, this year, my Vitamin D was low on the 2,000 and my, it was like 20.

My doc's like, "You got to increase that, Jill, so I want you to take 4,000 IUs for a couple weeks

And then, a few weeks, and then we'll see where you're at, and then you can go back down to your maintenance dose and we'll check that." So, the reason I'm telling you my stuff is because you get it checked. So, Karen's like, "Is that going to increase my risk for kidney stones?" Most likely not. If you got yours checked at the, 1,000 level and the doctor's like, "We need to up it," and check meaning you got a blood draw, and it's low on that, the doctor's like, "We're going to increase that to 3,000." "Okay, cool, doc.

When am I coming in for a blood test to see how that 3,000 IUs hits my blood?" You know, is it going to The range is between like 20 and 80 for Vitamin D. And so you don't want it to be You really don't want it to be below 40. You get it to be a little low then, okay?

So 40 is a nice little range for it. Will it increase her range, the 3,000 IUs, all the way to like 70 or 80? Doubtful, but she needs a blood test to see, right?

Calcium Intake and Bone Health Relationships

So,

There's a couple things. Now, we all know I don't do bone disease, but I hear a lot about it in my practice because wherever there is a kidney stone clinic, a bone clinic is close by. Dr.

Coe always says that. Because these disease states go hand-in-hand, so many patients will have kidney stones and bone issues for different reasons. One of the reasons is n- most of us adults have not gotten any calcium needs met

For decades! Decades! We stopped drinking milk because we heard it was bad for us, or we're allergic to it, or we have lactose intolerance, or causes whatever it is, for ethical reasons.

And then, you know, we didn't have the nut milks back then, so everybody's been walking around with not enough calcium. So, for you, Karen, I would if you were my student or patient, I would say, "Well, you know, what's your history with calcium? Are you getting some now?"

Because that's going to be super important, especially since you now having the increased diagnosis of osteoporosis. The other thing I'm going to ask is, you might want to ask your doctor, because it sounds like under this doctor's care, I'm not blaming anybody, I'm just saying, it sounds like you have your primary and a lot of them can treat your bone disease, no problem.

But I'm just wondering, was there enough guidance to keep you from going to the osteopenia to the osteoporosis now?

Do you feel like maybe, you know, you can ask the doctor, "Do you think I should get an endocrinologist in on board with us to look at things further?" So, there's a few things I would ask you. But the Vitamin D, 3,000 IUs, is that going to cause people to make kidney stones? Most likely, no, because it's a low dose.

But you have to get your blood checked to see where increased doses of Vitamin D take your blood level. I hope that makes sense. Does that make sense, Jeff?

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, because that's something that, like, you mentioned, like if you're taking supplements, why? Like, do you know you need to, because if you do, then they can very well be, like very important to all of it.

And one of the things, too, with D, it works like synergistically with calcium, am I correct there?

Yes, yes, yes. And then, you know, maybe the doctor wants also to add some vitamin K in there because that will help the Vitamin D in absorption. So, there's a lot of different routes she can go here, but as far as what we're talking about in the Kidney Stone Diet, I would definitely ask her I wouldn't have a problem with the Vitamin D at 3,000, but of course you'd get your blood checked to see where it raises you.

And also,

Before you do raise the vitamin the Vitamin D supplement, do you even need to? Meaning, does she get a lot of sun? Does she Is her Vitamin D low that is warranting the increase?

Or other or are there other things going on and it's not a Vitamin D problem? So, you know, these kind of questions are awesome and they can get a little gritty. There's always lots of other things to ask.

It's typically not just a black and white question.

But to answer her, Vitamin D at 3,000 units should not be a problem, but one must get a blood test to see where how that hits your blood, okay? And see how much it raises your Vitamin D from whatever the baseline was at the 1,000 IUs.

Yeah. And it's It ties right back to the checking in with ourselves. This is checking in with our blood work and checking in to make sure that we are understanding what we are doing and how it's impacting everything.

Absolutely. You know, what's interesting though, a lot of, you know, we patients we don't And I'm a patient with all my cancer care, so I know how sometimes, and even though I'm a nurse, I'm not a cancer nurse, you know? And again, when you're the patient, it's all very scary.

You kind of lose your any kind of rationale that you have. So, you know, we don't know what we don't know. I often have patients that come to me and they're like,

"Well, I was on Vitamin D like 10,000 units for, I don't know, a year! Nobody told me to go get a blood test! I had no idea.

I knew it was low. They told me to take that, and then now my Vitamin D is 125!" So, you know, and they're over-absorbing calcium now, so much that now there's extra in their urine. They don't urinate a lot.

That calcium's sitting in there and that's where oxalate and phosphate can connect to calcium and form crystals. So,

You know, I mean, it can be a problem. So, we don't know what we don't know. If our healthcare professionals don't tell us to get something checked, we don't know to do that.

And you go into the primary's office the next year and they do a Vitamin D check, "Oh, you're still on that 10,000, Crystal?" "Yeah. You know what, yeah, yeah, I am. You told me to take it." "Oh, we didn't recheck it." You know, this happens all the time, folks, so, you know, that's why we try to do these videos.

Any kind of small help that we can get out there, just things like what you should ask your doctor. That service that we have at kidneystonediet.com is invaluable. "Here's your urine collection results.

Here's Here are the things you need to talk to your doctor about. Here's what they could mean. Talk to the doctor about it." And patients go, "I thank God I called you because I would not have asked any of these things.

And if the doctor doesn't bring it up,

It doesn't get taken care of." And then, you know, going through your urine collection is super important because that's how you get on the best treatment plan to never make another stone. So, it's super important that we know what to ask our doctors, that we're educated. That's all I'm trying to say.

We must be our own advocates and we must get our information from credible people, so we can be armed with our tools before we go into the doctor's office. Especially nowadays,

Folks, after COVID, it's been a real mess trying to get into an appointment. The doctors, God bless them, they're running from patient to patient. It's just It's really bad, so we've got to really set ourselves up for an A+ appointment.

Yeah, for sure. Yeah, and you can find all those resources in the urine analysis and the Have a Better Doctor's Visit, just free resource all at kidneystonediet.com where you can find just all of it. Because that is so important.

Like you said, we don't know what we don't know and we're just trying to help every little in every different way we can in people's ears and through video, through the writing on the site, through all the different things. So, definitely like head over to the site, check everything out. You sign up for the free, weekly newsletter that Jill sends out to help keep you on track.

You can

You can just find the plethora of information, the premium course, the meal plans, and all of that. Oh, and I mentioned it last time, but we're on Patreon now, so if you wanted to There are people out there who ask, "How can we support the show?" Or just support the platform, just the message in general. If that's you, it's patreon.com/kidneystonediet.

It's no pressure. This is just so it exists, so people have a way to support if they if they care to and then

They'll get a little shout-out at the end of the episode. But, yeah, I think, with that, I think that's a good place to wrap on this one. So, yeah, thanks again for your question.

If you're out there with a question, the number is 773-789-8763 and we will feature you on a future episode. But, yeah, we really appreciate everyone who's, subscribed, gives the thumbs-up, leaves comments on YouTube. It means a lot.

But if you listen,

If you're on Apple podcasts, on Spotify, a little rating goes a long way. There should just be a As long as you've listened to a couple episodes, I think, on Spotify, then you have a rating option where you can choose hopefully five stars. If it isn't five stars, reach out!

Be like, "Maybe there's something you want to see that we're not, touching on," or give us a call. We'd love to, make sure we hit all of the knowledge, everything that you can, improve your life, improve your outcomes in any way. We want to we want to do that for you.

But, yeah, so, I think with that, we'll just wrap for this week.

Thank you, Karen! I loved you, Karen. Thank you for calling us.

Yeah, thank you so much, and we will see you next time.

Bye, guys.