Giving Vitamin D From Day One

  By Brook McHugh, M.D., Pediatric Alliance –Chartiers/McMurray Division     As I have told many parents of newborns, over and over, breastmilk has EVERYTHING in it your baby needs…except enough vitamin D! For years, pediatricians have told...

Rain, Rain, Go Away

Even though we expect more than our fair share of cloudy days here in Southwestern Pennsylvania, the amount of clouds — and rain — we’ve seen this spring and summer is getting to be a bit ridiculous.  The National Weather Service announced that last...

Vitamins – Cont’d

Yesterday, on The PediaBlog, I wrote that good nutrition starts at birth.  But actually, it starts before birth.  Science has shown that the risk of neural tube defects — like spina bifida — is reduced when women take folic acid (vitamin B9) during...

Taste Buds: Multivitamins

  Do children need to take multivitamins?  Professor and family doctor Yoni Freedhoff thinks not: So to answer the first question regarding kids and whether or not they need or benefit from taking a daily multivitamin I turned to the medical literature. Simply...

Go Outside!

We’ve discussed the importance of vitamin D to bone health and immune system function previously on The PediaBlog.  This video from AsapSCIENCE clearly illustrates one way we get vitamin D and other reasons why we should go outside more: Previous PediaBlog posts...