PN - Vitamin D = Good/Bad? Yes

The “K” in vitamin K comes from the German koagulation. Coagulation refers to the process of blood clot formation. This should hint to you that vitamin K plays a crucial role in the body’s blood clotting pathway.

Put simply, vitamin K allows the body to use calcium to perform its clotting function.

If vitamin K is low, the body can’t use calcium in this way, and therefore, cannot clot.

Besides its role in clotting, Vitamin K also helps to form and maintain our bones and teeth.

It does so by activating a specific protein called osteocalcin that helps the body use calcium and deposit it where it belongs.

In other words, there is a very potent calcium-vitamin K connection in that vitamin K helps the body use calcium properly. And if we’re deficient in vitamin K, calcium levels can build up and deposit themselves in our soft tissues.

People who are low in vitamin K are more likely to suffer from atherosclerosis, or calcification of the arteries.

And those with a high vitamin K intake (especially vitamin K2) seem to have less calcification of their arteries.

In fact, research in rats has shown that supplementing with vitamin K2 (but not K1) not only inhibits arterial calcification, it can also remove 30-50% of the calcium that has already been deposited.

Unfortunately, this magic effect has not been shown in humans as yet.

Hopefully by now, you can see the delicate dance that’s going on. Vitamin D increases calcium levels in the body. Vitamin K helps the body use calcium.

So if one were to supplement with high-dose vitamin D in the presence of vitamin K deficiency, the long-term results could be disastrous.

http://www.precisionnutrition.com/stop-vitamin-d

PN's conclusion: in the presence of other deficiencies, we should be careful of supplementation with vitamin D.

I think PN is right, because as the article explains, each of these micronutrients works in conjunction with each other.  D and K balance each other, in conjunction with magnesium and calcium and vitamin A.  Eat meat, vegetables, nuts and seeds, little fruit or starch, no sugar/wheat.

Kresser: K2

[A] study recently published by the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) has revealed that increased intake of vitamin K2 may reduce the risk of prostate cancer by 35 percent. The authors point out that the benefits of K2 were most pronounced for advanced prostate cancer, and, importantly, that vitamin K1 did not offer any prostate benefits.

The findings were based on data from more than 11,000 men taking part in the EPIC Heidelberg cohort. It adds to a small but fast-growing body of science supporting the potential health benefits of vitamin K2 for bone, cardiovascular, skin, brain, and now prostate health.
[A] popular misconception is that vitamins K1 and K2 are simply different forms of the same vitamin – with the same physiological functions.
[Vitamin K'2s role includes] protecting us from heart disease, ensuring healthy skin, forming strong bones, promoting brain function, supporting growth and development and helping to prevent cancer – to name a few. In fact, vitamin K2 has so many functions not associated with vitamin K1 that many researchers insist that K1 and K2 are best seen as two different vitamins entirely.
[Researchers] found that calcification of the arteries was the best predictor of heart disease. Those in the highest third of vitamin K2 intakes were 52 percent less likely to develop severe calcification of the arteries, 41 percent less likely to develop heart disease, and 57 percent less likely to die from it.
K2 is preferentially used by other tissues to deposit calcium in appropriate locations, such as in the bones and teeth, and prevent it from depositing in locations where it does not belong, such as the soft tissues.
http://chriskresser.com/vitamin-k2-the-missing-nutrient
The rest of this post is a good read, and I'm sure you are asking "where do I get K2?"

The list:  Natto, hard cheese, soft cheese, egg yolk, butter, chicken liver, salami, chicken breast, ground beef

Kresser continues:  It is important to note that commercial butter is not a significantly high source of vitamin K2. Dr. Weston A. Price, who was the first to elucidate the role of vitamin K2 in human health (though he called it “Activator X” at the time) analyzed over 20,000 samples of butter sent to him from various parts of the world. As mentioned previously in this paper, he found that the Activator X concentration varied 50-fold. Animals grazing on vitamin K-rich cereal grasses, especially wheat grass, and alfalfa in a lush green state of growth produced fat with the highest amounts of Activator X, but the soil in which the pasture was grown also influenced the quality of the butter. It was only the vitamin-rich butter grown in three feet or more of healthy top soil that had such dramatic curing properties when combined with cod liver oil in Dr. Price’s experiments and clinical practice.

Just another example of how a change in life habits - like switching from a hunter gatherer style to that of wheat farming/consumption - can have a significant impact via a nearly invisible mechanism.  I've got to find a way to make the kidneys, heart and liver from harvested wild animals taste/smell good enough to eat.

Fallon via Kresser: Cod Liver Oil

This conclusion is essentially the same as the conclusion reached by the Weston A. Price Foundation and the research of Chris Masterjohn; we have continually pointed out that vitamins A and D work together and that without vitamin D, vitamin A can be ineffective or even toxic. We do not recommend Nordic Naturals regular cod liver oil or any brand of cod liver oil that is low in vitamin D. But it is completely inappropriate to conclude from this 2004 study that cod liver oil is toxic because of its vitamin A content. Similar reviews could be put together showing the benefits of vitamin A and cod liver oil in numerous studies, including the studies from the 1930s. Obviously the solution is to use the type of cod liver oil that people took in the 1930s, which did not have most of the vitamin D removed by modern processing techniques.

http://chriskresser.com/separating-fact-from-fiction-on-cod-liver-oil
It's not that we recently discovered that humans eating a western diet need both fish oil and liver product supplementation - we rediscovered it.

Green Pastures Blue Ice Royal - Gel

This stuff is fabulous!  The cinimon flavor makes it taste like a dessert.

Recommended by Tim Ferriss and Ramiel Nagel

Eat Your Fat NOT Your Veggies!

http://video.foxnews.com/v/4419153/eat-your-fat-not-your-vegetables/?playlist_id=86892
Great piece, well done mylady!

Future Pundit - How to Get Your K On

http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/005750.html

He covers a study which shows a benefit for men on a vitamin K supplement, and brings home the bacon with how to get your K:
"If you want to max out your dietary vitamin K then eat a cup a day of kale, collards, or spinach. Each will give you over 1000 mcg vitamin K or more than double the amount used in this study. See a longer list of good vitamin K food sources at that link."


Eat meat, vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit little starch and no sugar or wheat.

K2 from HSB

http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/2007/12/food-sources-of-vitamin-k2.html
Another fantastic post from Dr. Davis, who has the gift of being able to put a large amount of useful information into a concise post.

"Vitamin K2 is emerging as an exciting player in the control and possible regression of coronary atherosclerotic plaque. Only about 10% of dietary vitamin K intake is in the K2 form, the other 90% being the more common K1.

I say that the conversation on vitamin K2 is emerging because of a number of uncertainties: What form of vitamin K2 is best (so-called MK-4 vs. MK7 vs. MK-9, all of which vary in structure and duration of action in human blood)? What dose is required for bone benefits vs. other benefits outside of bone health? Why would humans have developed a need for a nutrient that is created through fermentation with only small quantities in meats and other non-fermented foods?

Chicken contains about 8 mcg MK-4 per 3 1/2 oz serving; beef contains about 1 mcg. Egg yolks contain 31 mcg MK-4 per 3 1/2 oz serving (app. 6 raw yolks). Hard cheeses contain about 5 mcg MK-4 per 3 1/2 oz serving, about 70 mcg of MK-8,9; soft cheeses contain about 30% less. Natto contains about 1000 mcg of MK-7, 84 mcg MK-8, and no MK-4 per 3 1/2 oz serving.

Thanks to the research efforts of the Dutch and Japanese groups, several phenomena surrounding vitamin K2 are clear, even well-established fact:

--Vitamin K2 supplementation (via frequent natto consumption or pharmaceutical doses of K2) substantially improves bone health. While K2 by itself exerts significant bone density/strength increasing properties in dozens of studies, when combined with other bone health-promoting agents (e.g., vitamin D3, prescription drugs like Fosamax and calcitonin), an exaggerated synergy of bone health-promoting effects develop.

--The MK-4 form of vitamin K2 is short-lived, lasting only 3-4 hours in the body. The MK-7 form, in contrast, the form in natto, lasts several days. MK-7 and MK-8-10 are extremely well absorbed, virtually complete.

--Bone health benefits have been shown for both the MK-7 and MK-4 forms.

--Coumadin (warfarin) blocks all forms of vitamin K.

Interestingly, farm-raised meats and eggs do not differ from factory farm-raised foods in K2 content. (But please do not regard this as an endorsement of factory farm foods.)

Another interesting fact: Since mammals synthesize a small quantity of Vit K2 forms from vitamin K1, then eating lots of green vegetables should provide substrate for some quantity of K2 conversion. However, work by Schurgers et al have shown that K1 absorption is poor, no more than 10%, but increases significantly when vegetables are eaten in the presence of oils. (Thus arguing that oils are meant to be part of the human diet. Does your olive oil or oil-based salad dressing represent fulfillment of some subconscious biologic imperative?)

If we believe the data of the Rotterdam Heart Study, then a threshold of 32.7 micrograms of K2 from cheese yields the reduction in cardiovascular events and aortic calcification.

It's all very, very interesting. My prediction is that abnormal (pathologic) calcium deposition will prove to be a basic process that parallels atherosclerotic plaque growth, and that manipulation of phenomena that impact on calcium depostion also impact on atherosclerotic plaque growth. Vitamins D3 and K2 provide potential potent means of at least partially normalizing these processes.

As the data matures, I am going to enjoy my gouda, Emmenthaler, Gruyere, and feta cheeses, along with a few egg yolks. I'm going to be certain to include healthy oils like olive and canola with my vegetables."

My note - I don't view canola as healthy as it oxidizes too easily and does not contain the most useful forms of omega 3 fatty acids.