What Is Vitamin K Useful For?

Video: What Is Vitamin K Useful For?

Video: What Is Vitamin K Useful For?
Video: Vitamin K and blood clotting 2024, September
What Is Vitamin K Useful For?
What Is Vitamin K Useful For?
Anonim

Among the many useful and necessary for our body there is a "knight", which is often forgotten, but is very important. This is vitamin K.

It protects the skin, blood, bones and kidneys and was discovered at the beginning of the last century. The Danish scientist Henrik Dam studied the consequences of the lack of cholesterol in chickens.

After being fed a low-cholesterol diet, the chicks developed hemorrhage - bleeding into muscles, subcutaneous tissue and other body tissues.

During the tests, a substance was found to stop the bleeding. This substance was called vitamin K because of its ability to coagulate the blood.

For this discovery, Henrik Dam received the Nobel Prize in 1943. Vitamin is a group of fat-soluble compounds that are formed in two main forms.

This is phylloquinone, or vitamin K 1, and menaquinone, also called vitamin K 2. Vitamin K is synthesized in the small intestine by special microorganisms - saprophytic bacteria.

The main function of vitamin K in the body is to ensure normal blood clotting. It helps in the formation of a special chemical compound that is synthesized by the liver and helps the blood to clot.

Broccoli
Broccoli

In addition, vitamin K is invaluable for bone repair - it provides protein synthesis of the bone tissue on which calcium crystallizes.

This is especially important for children and adults who have suffered bone fractures. Vitamin K is vital for women during menopause, because that's when they develop osteoporosis.

Vitamin K increases the resilience of blood vessel walls. This is important for people who exercise actively - vitamin K reduces the risk of blood loss from injuries, and also increases muscle contraction.

Vitamin K helps prevent the formation of stones in the kidneys. When it happens that we eat spoiled food without knowing it, the substance coumarin, which is found in spoiled food, attacks the liver.

Then vitamin K is included, which neutralizes the action of coumarin. Vitamin K should not be taken as a prescription pill, as excessive use can lead to blood clots.

However, this cannot happen if you take vitamin K from food. It is found in all green plants as well as in leafy vegetables. It is also found in the following products: wheat, rye, oats and soybeans, eggs, liver, walnuts and all kinds of cabbage. Vitamin K is fat soluble and is best absorbed with little fat.

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