Can Vitamin D Supplements Help Reduce Chemotherapy Side Effects?

Chemotherapy is a common treatment for cancer and other diseases. However, chemotherapy can cause some severe side effects as it harms your healthy cells. People undergoing chemotherapy often have vitamin D deficiencies. A lack of vitamin D is associated with an increased risk of certain chemotherapy side effects, suggesting a potential role for vitamin D supplementation for patients undergoing this treatment. Talk to your doctor before taking vitamin D supplements.

Chemotherapy Side Effects

Chemotherapy consists of medications designed to kill rapidly dividing cells, because cancer cells typically divide more quickly than regular cells. However, these drugs can also affect healthy cells in your body, resulting in side effects. Although the side effects vary depending on the drugs used and the individual patient, many patients on chemotherapy will develop symptoms such as nausea, sores on their mucous membranes and fatigue.

Vitamin D

Vitamin D is a fat-soluble vitamin primarily found in certain kinds of fish, egg yolks and liver. Vitamin D is also added to milk for calcium absorption. Your body can also make vitamin D when you expose your skin to sunlight. A lack of vitamin D can cause low levels of calcium in your body, resulting in weakened bones. Vitamin D is also important for regulating the growth and death of cells in other tissues.

Chemotherapy and Vitamin D Intake

If you are undergoing chemotherapy, you have an increased risk of developing a vitamin D deficiency. Part of this is because many cancer patients spend less time in the sun, which reduces the body's natural production of vitamin D. Because you may eat less while undergoing chemotherapy, you may also get less vitamin D from your diet. This means that some of the side effects of chemotherapy may be related to vitamin D deficiencies. In addition, a lack of vitamin D could influence some of the oral ulcers and loss of taste that many patients undergoing chemotherapy develop, according to research published in "The Journal of Clinical Oncology" in 2011.

Considerations

Taking vitamin D supplements can help you ward off a deficiency due to a lack of dietary vitamin D and decreased sun exposure. However, you should talk to your doctor before taking vitamin D or any other type of supplement. Too much vitamin D can cause your calcium levels to become too high, resulting in health problems such as constipation, muscle twitching, flank pain, dementia and memory loss. Some vitamins and supplements can also interfere with the efficacy of chemotherapy.