Vitamin B6

 Vitamin B6 is a water-soluble vitamin that exists in three major chemical forms:

1. Pyridoxine
2. Pyridoxal
3. Pyridoxamine

This kind of vitamin performs a large variety of functions in our body and it is essential for promoting good health. Vitamin B6 has various functions. Here are some:

• A necessary for the synthesis and breakdown of amino acid, which is the building blocks of proteins
• Aids in fat and carbohydrate metabolism
• Maintain your blood glucose (sugar) within a normal range
• Assist in the formation of antibodies for our immune system to fight off diseases
• Acts in the formation of red blood cells
• Maintains normal central nervous system
• Aids in the removal of excess fluid of premenstrual women
• Promotes healthy skin that is radiant
• Reduces muscle spasms, leg cramps, numbness and stiffness in the hands, nausea
• Helps to maintain a proper balance of sodium and phosphorous in our body.

Vitamin B6 can be found in a wide variety of meat and vegetable. They can be found in cereals, bread, whole grains, fish including salmon and tuna, meats such as pork and chicken, bananas, beans such as legumes, peanut butter, and many green and leafy vegetables.

 As vitamin B6 is so vital to our body’s function, deficiency may results to any of the followings:

• Low the immune system’s antibodies use fight diseases
• Nervousness
• Insomnia
• Skin eruption
• Loss of muscular control
• Anemia
• Mouth disorders such as ulcers
• Muscular weakness
• Dermatitis
• Arm and leg cramps
• Loss of hair
• Slower learning abilities
• Water Retention

While a shortage of vitamin B6 will limit these functions, supplements of this vitamin do not enhance them in well-nourished individuals .

Medical research has rarely seen deficiency in vitamins B6 in well developed countries. It is known though that older people have a low blood level of vitamin B6. This may suggest a marginal or sub-optimal vitamin B6 nutrition status. Deficiency in vitamins B6 is higher seen in individual with poor quality diets such as those in the under developed countries. They also have a deficiency in many other nutrients. You would only see symptoms of deficiency when the intake has been very low for an extended period of time. Large does of vitamin B6 will also cause dysfunction such as neurological disorders and numbness.