Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2021 Dec 10;13(12):4415.
doi: 10.3390/nu13124415.

Vitamin D Dosing: Basic Principles and a Brief Algorithm (2021 Update)

Andrius Bleizgys  1
Affiliations
Review

Vitamin D Dosing: Basic Principles and a Brief Algorithm (2021 Update)

Andrius Bleizgys. Nutrients. .

Abstract

Nowadays, in modern societies, many people can be at high risk to have low vitamin D levels. Therefore, testing of serum 25-hydroxy-vitamin D (25OH-D) levels should be performed before prescribing them vitamin D supplementation. However, in some cases the 25OH-D level assessment is not available at the right moment, e.g., due to mandatory quarantine of COVID-19 outpatients. Therefore, such patients could be advised to start taking moderate vitamin D doses (e.g., 4000 IU/day for adults), and their 25-OH-D levels could be checked later. The proposed algorithm also comprises vitamin D dosing principles when baseline 25OH-D levels are known.

Keywords: COVID-19; calcidiol; supplementation; vitamin D.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The author declares no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Brief algorithm for vitamin D dosing.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Over 200 Scientists & Doctors Call for Increased Vitamin D Use to Combat COVID-19. [(accessed on 2 February 2021)]. Available online: https://vitamind4all.org/letter.html.
    1. Holick M.F. Vitamin D: Extraskeletal health. Endocrinol. Metab. Clin. Am. 2010;39:381–400. doi: 10.1016/j.ecl.2010.02.016. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Entrenas Castillo M., Entrenas Costa L.M., Vaquero Barrios J.M., Alcala Diaz J.F., Lopez Miranda J., Bouillon R., Quesada Gomez J.M. Effect of calcifediol treatment and best available therapy versus best available therapy on intensive care unit admission and mortality among patients hospitalized for COVID-19: A pilot randomized clinical study. J. Steroid. Biochem. Mol. Biol. 2020;203:105751. doi: 10.1016/j.jsbmb.2020.105751. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Rastogi A., Bhansali A., Khare N., Suri V., Yaddanapudi N., Sachdeva N., Puri G.D., Malhotra P. Short term, high-dose vitamin D supplementation for COVID-19 disease: A randomised, placebo-controlled, study (SHADE study) Postgrad. Med. J. 2020 doi: 10.1136/postgradmedj-2020-139065. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Tan C.W., Ho L.P., Kalimuddin S., Cherng B.P.Z., Teh Y.E., Thien S.Y., Wong H.M., Tern P.J.W., Chandran M., Chay J.W.M., et al. Cohort study to evaluate the effect of vitamin D, magnesium, and vitamin B12 in combination on progression to severe outcomes in older patients with coronavirus (COVID-19) Nutrition. 2020;79:111017. doi: 10.1016/j.nut.2020.111017. - DOI - PMC - PubMed