Do you question if you are getting enough Vitamin D from sunlight?

Or, where else you can get it with so little available sunlight during the wintertime.

Most people get their usual Vitamin D dose from the sun during the summer, but for many, synthesis can be hard to come by during the winter. The Synthesis of vitamin D is critical for both health and requires exposure to ultra violet-B rays from the sun. During the summer when the sun is directly overhead, vitamin D synthesis is easy to come by. For example, someone with light skin in a temperate climate at midday, 10 minutes a day of exposure to 10 percent of your body's surface area, your arm, and your face will give you what you need.

Many factors can also interfere with vitamin D synthesis. People with darker skin need two or three times the sun exposure to make the same amount of vitamin D, and synthesis declines with age. Environmental factors to consider like clouds, ozone, and air pollution can also decrease the likelihood of vitamin D production.
While a little bit of sun exposure can be good for you, too much can increase the risk of skin cancer. You have to do it in a safe way, where you get enough sun to make the vitamin D, but not too much that it can cause erythema, redness, or a sunburn.

While using sunscreen, hats, and protective clothing- those things can inhibit vitamin D synthesis. However, for a typically healthy person, your sun-protective behaviors do not lower your vitamin D levels much. Most people aren't vigilant enough to block all UVB exposure all the time.

In the wintertime, it is harder to get enough UVB to make vitamin D because people bundle up in cold weather and the sun stays lower in the sky. A person's vitamin D supply doesn't plummet immediately though in the winter. One thing to keep in mind is that our bodies can store vitamin D in the liver and fat tissues. There are always opportunities to make vitamin D in spring, summer, and fall.

Research shows that between September and March, the level of vitamin D drops in the wintertime. So it becomes important to rely on dietary sources or supplements to meet those needs. The Institute of Medicine recommends that healthy adults consume 600 IU of vitamin D per day. A three-ounce serving of salmon provides about 450 IU, and one cup of vitamin D-fortified cow's milk has about 120 IU. Fortified plant-based kinds of milk, orange juice, yogurt, margarine, and breakfast cereals are also available as well.