Men's Health Women's Health Senior's Health Antioxidants Sports Nutrition Diet & Weight Loss Vitamins & Minerals Herbs Specialty Supplements Targeted Supplements Spa Products Anti-Aging Basics Body Systems Body Structure Book Store Pet Health My Recommendation My Favorite Articles Our Most Popular Specials Bargain Basement Brands

MSM

Health News Archive 575 - Children's IBD
<<back to structure/function index

Vitamin D Deficiency Common in Kids with IBD

Children and adolescents with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) are at an increased risk of vitamin D deficiency and could benefit from supplements to avoid the health problems associated with not getting enough vitamin D.

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is said to affect about one person in every 500, which equates to over half a million people in the US. Traditional methods of treating or managing the disease are limited to a range of drugs and surgical intervention.

Lead researcher Helen Pappa, from Children's Hospital Boston, Massachusetts, said: One of the study's findings was a strong correlation between albumin level and vitamin D level, which may point to a "leaky gut" as one of the mechanisms for low vitamin D in this population.

The new research, published in the journal Pediatrics, analyzed the blood levels of vitamin D for 130 IBD patients (age range 8-22). Ninety-four of the patients had Crohn's disease and 36 had ulcerative colitis. Measures of parathyroid hormone and lumbar spine bone mineral density were also taken.

Vitamin D is produced in the skin on exposure to UVB radiation and can also be consumed in small amounts from the diet. However, recent studies have shown that sunshine levels in some northern countries are so weak during the winter months that the body makes no vitamin D at all, leading some to estimate that over half of the population in such countries have insufficient or deficient levels of the vitamin. Increased skin pigmentation also reduces the effect of UVB radiation meaning darker skinned people are more at risk.

Vitamin D deficiency can lead to a range of health problems, including increased risk of certain cancers, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and osteoporosis.

The researchers reported that the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency was 34.6 percent, with similar levels in both Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis patients. In patients with increased skin pigmentation serum levels of 25-hydroxy-vitamin D were about 53 percent lower, and during the winter months the average 25-hydroxy-vitamin D level in all the subjects was 33 percent lower.  The patients taking regular vitamin D supplements had serum vitamin D levels 31.5 percent higher than those not taking supplements.

Vitamin D deficiency is highly prevalent among pediatric patients with inflammatory bowel disease, wrote the researchers in Pediatrics. Factors predisposing to the problem include having a dark-skin complexion, winter season, lack of vitamin D supplementation, early stage of disease, more severe disease, and upper gastrointestinal tract involvement in patients with Crohn's disease.

The research merely links IBD to low serum vitamin D levels and there is not suggestion that vitamin D deficiency is the cause of IBD. Further research to examine the relationship is clearly merited and Dr. Pappa said: Our centre is planning prospective studies of the benefits of vitamin D supplementation on multiple aspects of the health of children with IBD.

Source: H. Pappa, C. Gordon, T. Saslowsky, A. Zholudev, B. Horr, M-C. Shih, R. Grand; Vitamin D Status in Children and Young Adults With Inflammatory Bowel Disease; Pediatrics; Volume 118, Number 5, November 2006, pp. 1950-1961 (doi:10.1542/peds.2006-0841).

back to top