In Part 1, I discussed the different forms of vitamin K and the importance of K2 in preventing two of the most widespread ailments in the modern world, namely atherosclerosis and osteoporosis. There we saw how K2 keeps calcium out of the arteries, forbidding hardening of the arteries, and channels it back into the bones and teeth, helping to keep the skeletal structure strong. Now, in Part 2, I will look at some of the other most important functions of K2 in the body and how it can prevent a number of other serious diseases.
New Discoveries About Vitamin K2
As I touched upon in Part 1, some of the highest concentration of vitamin K2 in the body are located in the salivary glands and the pancreas, with these organs showing a definite preference for vitamin K2 over K1 (found mostly in leafy green vegetables). The high amounts of vitamin K2 found in the pancreas is clearly related to regulating blood sugar, as we will see below. And, the presence of large amounts of K2 in the salivary glands is explained by its value in preventing, and possibly even reversing, dental caries, another area that we will look at.
Ongoing research into the properties of vitamin K2 indicates that more areas of interest are to be discovered in the future, two of which I won’t have space to go into but are nonetheless quite intriguing.
One is the preferential retention of vitamin K2 found in the testes of male rats and, to a lesser degree, also found in human testes. Which, when considered in conjunction with the fact that human sperm contains a protein that is vitamin K dependent, implies that it is necessary for healthy fertility. In fact, when rats were put on the MK4 version of K2 it demonstrably raised their testosterone levels, though this has yet to be confirmed as having the same effect among humans. (Source) Nonetheless, one more reason for aging men to consider supplementing with K2.
Another recent finding is that the kidneys store large amounts of vitamin K2, and also secrete a protein component dependent on K2, one that prevents the formation of calcium salts. We know that people who have kidney stones only secrete this protein in an inactive form that poorly inhibits the development of kidney stones, suggesting that K2 may be an important piece of the puzzle as to why some people develop kidney stones more than others do. (Source
More on Vitamin D and K2
Science has long known that vitamin D is essential for the absorption of calcium, but now we know that it is vitamin K2 that directs the calcium into the skeleton, while preventing it from being deposited in the organs, joints, and arteries.
There is now evidence that the safety of vitamin D3 is dependent on vitamin K2, and that vitamin D toxicity may be caused by vitamin K2 deficiency. The way it works is, vitamin D3 mobilizes calcium into the bloodstream, but if K2 is not present to channel the calcium into the bones, it can just build up as plaque on the arterial walls, leading to atherosclerosis. (Too much calcium in the blood is a condition known as hypercalcemia, and can lead to other symptoms aside from atherosclerosis.)
Vitamin K2 and vitamin D3 work together to increase what is known as Matrix GLA Protein (or MGP), the protein responsible for protecting your blood vessels from calcification, thus preventing hardening of the arteries. MGP status is so important that it can be used as a laboratory measure of your vascular and cardiac status, if you have a doctor advanced enough to give you such a test.
Since the body stores most of the vitamin D that it would obtain from sunshine, in an inactive form, converting it into an active form as required, we should be careful with supplements of vitamin D, as they are all in the active form of D3. In other words, we are ingesting an “end product” instead of a precursor, or building block, that allows the body to produce as much of the end product as it optimally requires. Therefore, anyone taking 5,000 IU, or more, of vitamin D3 daily, should definitely add a vitamin K2 supplement to the regimen, for that reason alone.
Vitamin K2 and Stroke
The importance of vitamin K2 in preventing osteoporosis may indicate another valuable function that it performs as well. In a “Study of Osteoporotic Fractures” it was shown that bone density is a good general predictor of early mortality. This study found that every standard deviation from normal bone density leads to a 20% greater risk of mortality in older women. An update to this study further confirmed the findings of the original study, concluding that there was a 1.23 greater risk of dying if a subject had one or more back fractures. As well, severe osteoporosis increased the risk of dying from a lung-related disorder by 2.6 times. (Source)
(Further to the subject of “lung-related disorders”, vitamin K2 has been shown to have
preventive and therapeutic effects on lung infections, including those caused by asthma and COVID-19. Source)
What was discovered was that the women with osteoporosis didn’t die from complications from broken bones or the resulting surgery: falling accounted for only about 3% of the mortalities in this study. The majority of deaths actually occurred mostly from cancer, heart attacks, and stroke. Science now suspects that osteoporosis is a warning sign that calcium has built up in the arteries instead of remaining in the bones, where it belongs.
The underlying cause of stroke is pretty much the same as the cause of a heart attack: damaged blood vessels. Up until recently, it was believed that a high sodium diet caused hypertension and strokes but recently, after studying new research, the JAMA came to the conclusion that “These results do not support a general recommendation to reduce sodium intake.” (The Truth About Salt blog.)
More recent studies have shown that another mineral that affects blood pressure, calcium, may be more likely to negatively affect blood pressure than sodium. (Killing with Calcium blog.)
The repeated link between high calcium intake (1200 – 1500 mg, supplemental) and stroke and heart disease, supports the concept that calcium build-up in the arteries is logically linked to causing strokes.
In the aforementioned “Study of Osteoporotic Fractures”, one standard deviation from the norm of bone density was equal to a three times increased risk of having a stroke and a 1.7 times increased risk for hypertension. And for further support of this theory, it has been shown that diets high in vitamin K prevent the thickening of arteries in rats prone to stroke. (Source)
Inflammation and K2
It is well known that inflammation is the root of many ailments including cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and arthritis. The older we get the more we produce the inflammatory compound called Interleukin-6, a chemical messenger known as a cytokine that is part of our immune system. When produced in normal amounts it is a necessary component of a healthy immune system, but when it overwhelms the other cytokines, IL-6 causes excessive inflammation.
This is confirmed by findings from the National Research Institute in Italy, that show IL-6 to be concentrated in damaged blood vessels and joints showing arthritic conditions. Their study showed that people with the highest amount of IL-6 were nearly twice as likely to develop mobility-related ailments. Elevated levels of IL-6 were also found in people with symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease, also a disease characterized by symptoms of inflammation. (Source) Fortunately vitamin K2 also inhibits both IL-6 and general inflammation. (Source)
Alzheimer’s Disease
Some years ago a research scientist at the University of North Carolina discovered that hemodialysis patients were more prone to bone fractures, and at the same time had higher than normal levels of a compound called “apolipoprotein E” in their blood. The scientist (Dr. M. Kohlmeier) suspected that these people might also be prone to poor vitamin K status or may not absorb or produce it well, and eventually studies confirmed this fact. Later, elevated levels of this apoE compound were directly linked to Alzheimer’s disease. The combination of low vitamin K and high apoE affected the body’s ability to regulate calcium levels in the brain. And, indeed, studies have found that patients with Alzheimer’s disease have unhealthy calcium levels in their brains. (Source)
As one comprehensive study of the benefits of vitamin K summarized: “Overall, both VK1 and VK2 are beneficial for protecting the nervous system and maintaining brain homeostasis, thus playing a positive role in the treatment of AD. According to existing studies, the correlation between VK2 and AD is greater than that of VK1.” (Source)
Insulin Regulation and Diabetes
The fact that some of the highest levels of vitamin K are stored in the pancreas has led to the idea that it may also be a necessary part of controlling blood sugar levels.
Japanese scientists did study the link between vitamin K and insulin function in the body and, while it was an animal study, what occurred with vitamin K deficiency mimicked what occurs with diabetes. That is that the deficiency in vitamin K interferes with the clearance of glucose from the blood and then stimulates an excessive insulin release. (Source)
A small scale human study, done in 2011, concluded: “To summarize, we have demonstrated for the first time that vitamin K2 supplementation for 4 weeks increased insulin sensitivity in healthy young men.” (Source
Rat studies have even demonstrated a benefit of vitamin K2 on the damaging effects of Type 1 Diabetes, the most serious form of this disease. (Source)
Considering that insulin malfunction is linked not only to diabetes, which is bad enough, but also to the risk of developing certain types of cancer and to Alzheimer’s disease, the importance of taking in adequate amounts of vitamin K2 becomes even more obvious.
Antioxidant Properties
Free radical damage in the body, caused by toxins, radiation, and reactive oxygen molecules, are responsible for cancer, heart disease, inflammatory conditions, and premature aging. That vitamin K2 also serves an antioxidant function over and above its other many functions, makes it an important part of our body’s basic survival mechanisms.
One animal study subjected the test subjects to extreme free radical damage and found that vitamin K2 alone protected their livers from this oxidative stress. Another study showed vitamin K2 to be almost as effective as vitamin E in preventing oxidation of fatty acids, a benchmark of its antioxidant activity. (Source)
Autism
One researcher (Catherine Tamaro, B.S.M.E.) has proposed that Vitamin K deficiency, which causes calcium to be unregulated in the body, and to deposit and form calcium oxalate crystals in the body, may be a cause of many of the symptoms associated with autism. (Source) Calcium oxalate crystals are found in many autistic children.
Calcium triggers neurons in the brain to fire, and excess calcium in the blood can cause the neurons to over-fire until they actually die. It is therefore suggested that the addition of Vitamin K to the diet of those with autism, would activate the bone proteins that regulate calcium, thereby reducing the over-firing of these neurotransmitters, and aiding in calming their brains.
An independent study published in the medical journal Frontiers in Nutrition (in 2021) concluded “that MK-4 is present in lower concentrations in children with ASD, which may affect cognition and developmental quotients. The role of MK-4 in ASD needs to be further explored.” (Source)
Vitamin K2 and Cancer
A number of studies have linked vitamin K2 deficiency to increased cancer risk. The “European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition” involved over 24,000 participants from the ages of 35 to 64, all who were free of cancer when enrolled in the study.
The participants were tracked for cancer incidence and mortality for an average of 10 years. Part of the study tracked their vitamin K1 and K2 dietary intake over these years and compared it to cancer incidence and mortality.
What they discovered was that vitamin K2, but not K1, was inversely associated with the risk of getting cancer and dying from it. The benefits of vitamin K2 intake was, for some reason, better for men than women, especially showing a dramatic reduction in both lung and prostate cancer. The researchers concluded that the “intake of menaquinones, which is highly determined by the consumption of cheese, is associated with a reduced risk of incident and fatal cancer.” (Certain types of cheeses being some of the few sources of vitamin K2 found in the modern diet.) (Source)
Observations from this study indicated that the higher the intake of K2, the lower the risk of all forms of prostate cancer. But the most significant protection offered by vitamin K2 was against advanced prostate cancer, in which case it was associated with a 63% reduction in risk.
At the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, researchers have found that people who have higher intakes of vitamin K have a lower risk of developing Non-Hodgkin lymphoma. In this study, even vitamin K1 (found mostly in leafy greens) showed a preventative value in reducing cancer risk. Those who had the highest levels of vitamin K1 from diet and/or supplements had a 45% less risk for developing this form of lymphoma. (Source)
Researchers in Japan discovered that vitamin K2 may play a role in preventing the type of liver cancer caused by viral cirrhosis. In a 2004 study, 40 women with viral liver cirrhosis were studied, and half the women were given 45 mg vitamin K2 - MK4 per day.
The participants were followed for just over 7 years, after which it was determined that vitamin K2 supplementation was found to decrease the risk of the development of liver cancer in these subjects, possibly by delaying the onset of cancer. In the group treated with the vitamin K2, two of 21 patients developed liver cancer, compared to the group who did not receive vitamin K2 supplements, where 9 of 19 patients developed liver cancer. (Source)
Blood Thinning Drugs
If we see a link between vitamin K deficiency and increased cancer rates, then we have to wonder what effect blood-thinning drugs (such as Warfarin) will have on cancer rates, since such drugs work by blocking vitamin K from doing its blood-clotting function. Since these blood-thinning drugs disable vitamin K activity, they also impede its antioxidant functions which must expose cells to higher amounts of free radical damage.
And indeed, a recent study looked at Warfarin use in men who had developed prostate cancer. There appeared to be no danger for the first 2 years of using Warfarin, but for those taking Warfarin for 4 or more years there was a 220% increased risk of having advanced prostate cancer. Evidently this finding could be explained simply by having a long-term depletion of antioxidant activity in the body. (Source)
In Part 3, I will look at the proven benefits of K2 for preventing and treating more ailments, including Parkinson’s Disease, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Inflammatory Bowel Diseases, and Multiple Sclerosis. And we will look at its benefit for dental health and find out what depletes K2 from our body.
I have to say, the more I write on this subject the more miraculous this simple nutrient seems to be. So, don’t wait for Part 3 to decide if you need a K2 supplement. We all do. So, I suggest you acquire a high quality vitamin K2 product (Quick K2) and get started right now.
(Author: All newsletters and blogs are written by Ken Peters who has worked as a nutritional consultant for the last 30 years, and as product designer for NutriStart for the last 25 years. He has also authored two books - Health Secrets Vol. 1&2. He may be reached at: kenpetersconsulting@gmail.com)