A sudden change in the amount of vitamin K you get can cause dangerous bleeding (if you consume less) or blood clots (if you consume more).
Vitamin K helps your blood to clot (thicken to stop bleeding). Warfarin works by making it harder for your body to use vitamin K to clot blood. Changes in the amount of vitamin K that you normally eat can affect how warfarin works.
In fact, high doses of vitamin K can make clotting problems worse in these people.
Vitamin K plays a key role in helping the blood clot, preventing excessive bleeding. Unlike many other vitamins, vitamin K is not typically used as a dietary supplement. Vitamin K is actually a group of compounds. The most important of these compounds appears to be vitamin K1 and vitamin K2.
Thick blood is caused by heavy proteins, or by too much blood in the circulation. Too many red cells, white cells, and platelets will result in blood thickening. Another cause is an imbalance in the blood clotting system.
Taking Vitamin D3 with Vitamin K2 helps to ensure the calcium transported by the Vitamin D is absorbed by your bones where it's needed, rather than accumulating in deposits in your arteries. Many readily-available Vitamin D products on the market don't contain K2.
Introduction: Vitamin K, which is consumed as phylloquinone (K1) and menaquinone (K2), impacts some vitamin-K dependent proteins involved in hemostasis. It is unknown whether dietary intake of phylloquinone and menaquinone are associated with incident pulmonary embolism (PE) risk.
Coumadin is the common brand name for warfarin. To ensure that warfarin is effectively thinning your blood, it's important to eat about the same amount of vitamin K every day. Vitamin K normally helps your blood clot so wounds don't bleed too much. Warfarin works against vitamin K, making your blood clot more slowly.
Finally, Masley says that the same foods that are bad for cardiovascular health in general can also increase your risk of developing blood clots. That means you want to stay away from unhealthy trans fats, from the saturated fats in full-fat dairy and fatty meats, and from all types of sugar.
Don't: Eat the Wrong Foods
So you have to be careful about the amounts of kale, spinach, Brussels sprouts, chard, or collard or mustard greens you eat. Green tea, cranberry juice, and alcohol can affect blood thinners, too. So ask your doctor about them.
"Vitamin K1 has a relatively short half-life and is rapidly cleared from the blood and is cleared by the liver within eight hours. In comparison vitamin K2 has a longer half-life of up to 72 hours, meaning it remains biologically active in the body for longer.
No tolerable upper limit has been determined for vitamin K. Toxicity is rare and unlikely to result from eating foods containing vitamin K. However, taking any type of supplement can lead to toxicity.
Vitamin K is a group of vitamins that the body needs for blood clotting, helping wounds to heal. There's also some evidence vitamin K may help keep bones healthy.
Vitamin K helps to make four of the 13 proteins needed for blood clotting, which stops wounds from continuously bleeding so they can heal. People who are prescribed anticoagulants (also called blood thinners) to prevent blood clots from forming in the heart, lung, or legs are often informed about vitamin K.
There are no known serious side effects from taking too much vitamin K2. However, it is sensible to stick to the recommended intake.
Thrombolytics. Thrombolytics are drugs that dissolve blood clots. A doctor may give a thrombolytic intravenously, or they may use a catheter in the vein, which will allow them to deliver the drug directly to the site of the clot. Thrombolytics can increase the risk of bleeding, however.
The AI for men and women is 120 and 90 μg/day, respectively. No adverse effect has been reported for individuals consuming higher amounts of vitamin K, so a Tolerable Upper Intake Level (UL) was not established.
If you are a heart patient who is taking blood thinners, such as warfarin (Coumadin®), you need to be careful not to overdo vitamin K. Blood thinners are often prescribed for people at risk for developing harmful blood clots.
Vitamin K2 Side Effects
Constipation or diarrhea. Loss of appetite or bad taste in your mouth. Nausea, heartburn, or upset stomach.
No interactions were found between magnesium oxide and Vitamin K. However, this does not necessarily mean no interactions exist. Always consult your healthcare provider.
Increasing one's intake of vitamin D without enough vitamin K can cause an increase in calcium levels without the ability to use it effectively, which raises the risk of depositing calcium in arteries and soft tissue. This is dangerous because it can lead to heart disease, heart attack and even stroke.
A person with thick blood, or hypercoagulability, may be prone to blood clots. When blood is thicker or stickier than usual, this often results from an issue with the clotting process. Specifically, an imbalance of the proteins and cells responsible for blood clotting can lead to hypercoagulability.