What are the benefits of Vitamin K?
Vitamin K refers to a group of fat-soluble vitamins that play a role in blood clotting, bone metabolism, and regulating blood calcium levels. The body needs vitamin K to produce prothrombin, a protein and clotting factor that is important in blood clotting and bone metabolism.
Vitamin K refers to structurally similar, fat-soluble vitamers found in foods and marketed as dietary supplements.
Vitamin K1 is primarily from plants, especially leafy green vegetables. Small amounts are provided by animal-sourced foods. Vitamin K2 is primarily from animal-sourced foods, with poultry and eggs much better sources than beef, pork or fish.
Vitamin K is an important factor in bone health and wound healing. It is a fat-soluble vitamin that makes proteins for healthy bones and normal blood clotting. Vitamin K helps produce four of the 13 proteins needed for blood clotting.
The recommended adequate intake for vitamin K depends on age and gender. Women aged 19 years and over should consume 90 micrograms (mcg) a day, and men should have 120 mcg.
Vitamin K is given shortly after birth in the form of intramuscular injection, and it is more effective in preventing vitamin K deficiency bleeding than oral administration. Bleeding in infants due to vitamin K deficiency can be severe, leading to hospitalization, Brain damage, and death.
Vitamin K offers a wide variety of health benefits from maintaining bone strength to possibly preventing heart disease. It's especially important for wound-healing, as vitamin K helps your blood to clot.
Listed below are some of the benefits of Vitamin K.
Benefits of Vitamin K
⦁ Strengthens Bone health
Vitamin K plays a crucial role in this cell turnover process, promoting the cycle of cell growth and replacement that maintains your bone strength and keeps them resistant to breaking.
⦁ Prevents Heart disease
Vitamin K may help keep blood pressure lower by preventing mineralization, where minerals build up in the arteries. This enables the heart to pump blood freely through the body.
Mineralization naturally occurs with age, and it is a major risk factor for heart disease. Adequate intake of vitamin K has also been shown to lower the risk of stroke.
⦁ Helps heal wounds
Vitamin K helps turn blood from a liquid to a sticky, gel-like consistency that then hardens into a scab. Without blood clotting, any injury would cause you to bleed to death. Whenever you get a scrape, cut, or bruise certain proteins in the blood, that rely on vitamin K to function properly, cause your blood to coagulate, or clot, to stop the bleeding.
People with blood conditions like hemophilia, as well as people who take blood thinners, may have difficulty with blood clotting. It's important to maintain an adequate and stable intake of vitamin K, preferably through your diet versus in a supplement.
⦁ Cognitive health
Increased blood levels of vitamin K have been linked with improved episodic memory in older adults.
In one study, healthy individuals over the age of 70 years with the highest blood levels of vitamin K1 had the highest verbal episodic memory performance.
Sources
Vitamin K1 occurs in high amounts in leafy green vegetables, such as Kale and Swiss chard. Other sources include vegetable oils and some fruits.
Sources of menanoquines, or K2, include meat, dairy products, eggs, and Japanese “natto,” made from fermented soy beans.
Dietary fat enhances the absorption of vitamin K, so a salad of green leaves drizzled olive oil would both provide vitamin K and help the body absorb it.
Vitamin K deficiency
Vitamin K deficiency in adults is rare. But, it can occur in people with:
⦁ Liver disease
⦁ Cirrhosis (liver scarring)
⦁ Crohn's disease, celiac disease, or those who had bariatric surgery
sources
https://en.wikipedia.org
https://www.webmd.com
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com
