Vitamin D and health in the 21st century: federal initiatives to advance research.

ABSTRACT

The role for dietary supplements for health maintenance and disease prevention is receiving increasingly more attention in the public media as well as in academic institutions and research centers. The mission of the National Institutes of Health Office of Dietary Supplements is to support and promote the science on the benefits and risks of dietary supplements. To this end, Office of Dietary Supplements supports a number of initiatives to advance the evidence base on vitamin D. These initiatives include an evidence-based review on the relationship of vitamin D and calcium intakes to nutrient status indicators and health outcomes; developing and validating analytical methods for measuring vitamin D in biological fluids and foods; support for continued collection of vitamin D status indicators through the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey; and funding for National Institutes of Health grants on vitamin D and related health outcomes. Taken together, these programs address research gaps and needs to further the science and exploration of the role of vitamin D in health.