Anyone know of healthy Vitamin D sunlamps?

November 28, 2010 10:17 AM

Can anyone recommend a good sunlamp for getting Vitamin D?

I have some kind of sensitivity to Vitamin D supplements that I ingest, but don't notice any bad effects from sunlight, so I think I may need to absorb D in light. I hear UVB-emitting lamps are better for not causing cancer. I also found lamps made by a company named Sperti. Anyone heard of this, or know of a better company??? THANKS!

posted by bross12 to Health & Fitness (2 answers total)

Response by poster: This was a brilliant question Ben. It's not your fault no one responded. Just keep asking. They will respond. They love you.
posted by bross12 at 3:17 PM on December 8, 2010 [2 favorites]

This guy (Michael F. Holick, Ph.D., M.D. is Professor of Medicine, Physiology and Biophysics; Director of the General Clinical Research Center; and Director of the Bone Health Care Clinic and the Heliotherapy, Light, and Skin Research Center at Boston University Medical Center.) says that Sperti is your only choice because no one else is willing to put the short and very penetrating wavelengths of UV he thinks are necessary to generate sufficient vitamin D into a sunlamp-- and the page I linked is a Sperti page.

I have a really old one I picked up at the Goodwill (they've been making them since the '50's), but I have yet to use it for its intended purpose because it is just so frighteningly bright.

You can listen to a fairly long and persuasive radio program about this issue, in which Holick is one of two featured guests, here.
posted by jamjam at 5:47 PM on December 10, 2010