Can a Nutrient Deficiency Result In Sunburn? If your body doesn’t make get or make enough of a nutrient, the lack can make you more apt to sunburn.
Can A Nutrient Deficiency Result In Sunburn? Yes, a nutrient deficiency can result in more sun-sensitive skin.
How do you know if you are at risk? By being aware of how you are protecting your skin from the sun.
What are you doing to make sure you don’t get too much sun? Are you wearing sunscreen? Remember your sunhat and sunglasses? Did you grab your sun blocking shirt to keep too much sun off the trunk of your body and your arms?
OK, let’s talk about why we can have a deficiency to start with.
Why Am I Suddendly Sensitive To The Sun?
Which nutrient deficiency causes sun sensitivity?
When your body does not get enough of some of the nutrients it needs, your skin can become sensitive to sunlight.
Pellagra is what most often develops when your body is not able to make niacin. The main symptoms of pellagra are dermatitis (Dermatitis is a general term that describes a common skin irritation. There are many causes and forms. However, itchy, dry skin or a rash will be present.
Pellagra is a disease caused by low levels of niacin, also known as vitamin B-3. It’s marked by dementia, diarrhea, and dermatitis. If left untreated, pellagra can be fatal.
Pellagra is much less common than it used to be. It’s still a problem in many developing countries where corn is the mainstay in the diet.
It can also affect people whose bodies, for some reason just don’t properly absorb niacin.
A niacin deficiency is behind the skin issues that will progress to photosensitivity. Photosensitivity is an extreme sensitivity to UV rays from the sun. Most people are at risk of developing sunburn when exposed to sunlight for unhealthy lengths of time.
Other nutrients, particularly antioxidants and flavonoids, may help protect skin against sun damage in healthy people.
What Is A Nutrient?
- A nutrient is a substance that provides nourishment that is essential for growth and the maintenance of life. “Fish is a source of many important nutrients, including protein, vitamins, and minerals.” From Oxford Languages
Often with a shortage of nutrients, the condition that is developing happens slowly, not overnight. This allows a definite problem to develop before the patient is aware and any treatment begins.
We don’t know that our bodies aren’t producing enough niacin. It takes a while to show up and get treated. This is the time span that the sun can be such an enemy.
Since you can sunburn quicker, and deeper when your body is in a distressed condition, taking care of yourself is important.
Using safe healthy guidelines for outside time and sun exposure must become a habit for each of us. This is why you need to use sun blocking clothing to help sunscreen and overall awareness to protect your skin.
Symptoms Of Low Nican Levels
There really isn’t a test to know that you are low in niacin.
The main symptoms of pellagra are dermatitis, dementia, and diarrhea.
Niacin deficiency is most noticeable in body parts with high rates of cell turnover, like your skin or gastrointestinal tract.
Dermatitis related to pellagra usually causes a rash on the face, lips, feet, or hands. In some people, dermatitis forms around the neck, a symptom known as the Casal necklace.
I do remember my Mom in the later years of her life developing an itchy ring around her hands. Where the palms of her hands met the skin that came down over the backs of her hands. We tried several different hand creams with varying rates of success.
We didn’t consult the Doctor, as she thought it was part of getting old.
Maybe for her, it was. However, as I remember her discomfort and trying to find a remedy ourselves, for this kind of skin issue. The condition came slowly and may have been her body slowing down on making the niacin that she needed.
Additional dermatitis symptoms include:
- red, flaky skin
- areas of discoloration, ranging from red to brown
- thick, crusty, scaly, or cracked skin
- itchy, burning patches of skin.
More Serious Symptoms Of Nuterient Deficiencey
In some cases, the neurological signs (actual physical signs) of pellagra appear early on. Most often the symptoms are hard to identify.
As the disease progresses, possible dementia symptoms can develop and include:
- apathy (absence of feeling or emotion.)
- depression
- confusion, irritability, or mood changes
- headaches
- restlessness or anxiety
- disorientation or delusions
Other possible pellagra symptoms will often include:
- sores on the lips, tongue, or gums
- decreased appetite
- trouble eating and drinking
- nausea and vomiting
Most of the conditions described here can easily be found in a lot of Senior Citizens. We have been conditioned to think there is little to be done or little reason to try to intervene at this point.
Add to this the times that we didn’t realize we were exposing our skin to the sun when this same skin was not healthy. We didn’t realize that when we were allowing our face, neck, nose, ears to get too much sun we were setting the stage for more problems.
When a little bit of niacin deficiency gets added to years of too much sun exposure your combined problems make the 2 lesser issues more important, and more able to cause problems for you.
How To Protect Your Skin From Sunburn
Taking steps to develop good skin protection habits is easier than it has been in the past. We have known that we should take better care of ourselves, but old careless skincare habits have been slow to change.
With the addition of SPF treated and rated clothing, we can now protect your skin by slipping on a comfortable loose-fitting long sleeve shirt and blocking the sun off our skin.
You will need to add sunscreen sometimes as well, but slipping on a shirt will go a long way in protecting your skin. Even for keeping it looking younger, covering our skin will be quick and easy while remaining cool and comfortable.
As we are learning, we do have to make an effort to protect our skin. To ignore this part of taking care of ourselves will leave us venerable. It is simple to take action.
Wearing a sun hat, sunglasses, and a lightweight sun blocking shirt is a part of my future.
Can you make some changes?
A Quick Pellegra Warning
We don’t see so much pellagra in people under 50 years old. The fortified foods we now eat help us get better levels of niacin. However, as we age, the diet is often not enough to keep us healthy, if our body for some reason does not make or hang on to niacin.
Your overall diet and nutrition are important for having a healthy senior citizen life span. Being able to stay involved in life and living and enjoying the age we find ourselves in is very dependent on your health.
If you have dry itchy skin, call the spot to your healthcare professional’s attention. If you have a senior relative or neighbor, be observant for healthy skin. When you see something that looks less than healthy, mention it to your acquaintance and suggest they have that spot checked.
Often it just takes a concerned word or two to get a treatment plan started.
Does Taking Vitamin D Cause Sun Senisitivity
Taking recommended doses of Vitamin D should not cause sun sensitivity. There is no reason to take excess doses unless you are in the care of your doctor.
When trying to get vitamin D through natural sources, the sun, it is possible to experience sunburn if you are not careful with the sun exposure to your skin.
In the warmer months of the year, exposure for your getting the vitamin D you need should happen before 10 AM and after 4 PM. This can help control too much sun and sunburn.
In the cooler time of the year, your exposure should happen before 11 AM and after 3 PM. Avoiding the more dangerous times of day for exposure will help control overexposure. After your 20 or so minutes, slip on your sun blocking shirt.
Other Reasons Your May Be Sun Sensitive
There are two main types of drug reactions that indicate a sun-sensitizing drug reaction. They are:
Photoallergy. Problems can occur when your skin is exposed to the sun after certain medicines or compounds are applied to the skin’s surface.
The ultraviolet (UV) light of the sun causes a structural change in the drug. This, in turn, causes the production of antibodies that are responsible for the sun-sensitivity reaction.
The reaction usually includes an eczema-type rash, which often occurs a few days after exposure. The rash can also spread to parts of the body that were not exposed to the sun.
Phototoxicity. This is the most common type of sun-sensitivity drug reaction.
It can occur when skin is exposed to the sun after certain medications are injected, taken orally, or applied to the skin.
The drug absorbs the UV light, then releases it into the skin, causing cell death.
Within a few days, symptoms appear on the exposed areas of the body. In some people, symptoms can persist up to 20 years after the medication is stopped.
Among the most common phototoxic drugs are amiodarone (Cordarone, a heart medication).NSAIDs (nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs such as ibuprofen), and the tetracycline family.
What other medications make you sensitive to sunlight?
- Antibiotics (ciprofloxacin, doxycycline, levofloxacin, tetracycline, trimethoprim)
- Antifungals (flucytosine, griseofulvin, voriconazole)
- Antihistamines (cetirizine, diphenhydramine, loratadine, promethazine, cyproheptadine)
These are the most common ones that are taken.
Then We Add Immunideficiency
im·mu·no·de·fi·cien·cy/ˌimyənōdəˈfiSHənsē,iˌmyo͞onōdəˈfiSHənsē/Learn to pronouncenounnoun: immunodeficiency; plural noun: immunodeficiencies
Definition: The failure of the immune system to protect the body adequately from infection, due to the absence or insufficiency of some component process or substance.
- Immunodeficiency disorders disrupt your body’s ability to defend itself against bacteria, viruses, and parasites.
- There are two types of immunodeficiency disorders: those you are born with (primary), and those that are acquired (secondary).
- Anything that weakens your immune system can lead to a secondary immunodeficiency disorder.
If you have overexposed your skin to the sun through the years, you may have damaged the DNA in your skin that causes your skin to heal.
If this has happened, your body may not be able to protect you as well because the weak places in your skin will not work as they should.
Your will have areas in your skin that are more pron to skin cancer. Your skin has a big responsibility and when working properly is not noticed. It is only when the problems develop that we pay attention.
Sun Blocking Clothing Protects Your Body
It is often difficult to remember that something as simple as putting on a sun hat and sunglasses. Remembering to grab your loosfitting long sleeve shirt.
These 3 items will hold you very well for some time in the sun. We all love to be out and in truth love the tanned look we get. The whole idea of not getting as much tan as we can just does not seem right.
However, we have had a lifetime to develop the love of tan skin. Only a few years have we been aware of how the sun can get us in trouble in a hurry.
Clothing styles also affedt how we think, even if you are an independent thinker! Seeing the less modest dress that has taken over our society it is apparent that we have forgotten the importace of clothes.
We occasionally watch the TV series, Tough As Nails. The guys have at least a short sleeve tee shirt. The women wear more tank tops. There is a need to protect your body in that series. Just to keep your skin cleaner in the different things they do.
As a mom whose family is grown, I would like to see the girls taking care of their skin. Staying safer. Yes, I know, it looks so old fashioned. But, use your clothing to protect yourself from the sun and the damage it can do so quickly.
Sami’s Take On Can Nutrient Deficiency Result In Sunburn?
Who knew that so much depends on your nutrition? We have heard it all our lives. You are what you eat. All those reminders of how to stay healthy and your need for a good diet.
When you overexpose your skin to the sun, you will find that besides looking older, you can well be setting the stage for other health problems.
As I remember helping my folks with Doctor appointments. Then the follow up care as they got older. The association between their health and their life style was apparent.
We need to remember that when people get to the senior citizen stage of life, that many things contribute to your health picture.
Helping seniors remember to take care of their skin and slip on sun blocking clothing. Wear their sun hats and sunglasses. Keep sunscreen handy. These are good habits for any age.
The different things that develop for some people, like the innounodeficiency disorders can be handled easier when you have not cooked your skin in the sun.
For those who enjoy and participate in outdoor soprts and activities, our self care habits can make our skin healthier. Starting with a good basic sun blocking habits.
How you protect your skin is a mind set. How you live your life is a life style. Are you in a skin safety mind set? Is your life style a skin safe one?
Are you helping your family be aware of protecting their skin from the sun? Building good sun safety habits for a healthier life?