The role of vitamin D in reducing gastrointestinal disease risk and assessment of individual dietary intake needs: Focus on genetic and genomic technologies.
With the endogenous formation of vitamin D being significantly curtailed because of public awareness of skin cancer dangers, attention is turning to dietary sources. Cumulative evidence has implicated vitamin D deficiency in increasing susceptibility to various gastrointestinal disorders, including colorectal cancer, inflammatory bowel diseases, diverticulitis, and irritable bowel syndrome. There is also reason to suggest adjunct vitamin D therapy for such diseases. Although there is justification for increasing vitamin D intake overall, optimal intakes will vary among individuals. Genomic technologies have revealed several hundreds of genes associated with vitamin D actions. The nature of these genes emphasizes the potentially negative implications of modulating vitamin D intakes in the absence of complementary human genetic and genomic data, including information on the gut microbiome. However, we are not yet in a position to apply this information. Genomic data (transcriptomics, metabolomics, proteomics, and metagenomics) could provide evidence that vitamin D sufficiency has been achieved. We suggest that there is an increasingly strong case for considering the more widespread use of vitamin D fortified foods and/or dietary supplements to benefit gastrointestinal health. However, intake levels might beneficially be informed by personalized genetic and genomic information, for optimal disease prevention and maintenance of remission.
Molecular nutrition food research