Children with Cancer were 6X more likely to have less than 10ng of vitamin D
Vitamin D status in paediatric patients with cancer
Research Article
Akash Sinha MBBS1,
Peter Avery PhD2,
Steve Turner BSc3,
Simon Bailey PhD4,
Tim Cheetham MD1,5, tim.cheetham@nuth.nhs.uk
Article first published online: 3 FEB 2011; DOI: 10.1002/pbc.22963
1 Department of Paediatric Endocrinology, Great North Children's Hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
2 School of Mathematics and Statistics, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
3 Department of Clinical Biochemistry, Great North Children's Hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
4 Department of Paediatric Oncology, Great North Children's Hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
- Institute of Human Genetics, Newcastle University, Central Parkway, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
Background
Children with malignant disease are at increased risk of bone disorders and cardiovascular disease. Vitamin D status may influence this risk and so we assessed vitamin D levels in children with malignant disease undergoing active treatment or surveillance post-therapy.
Procedure
This was an outpatient-based cross-sectional study of 61 children with a history of malignancy (median age 11.1 years; range 1.5–24.4 years) and 60 control subjects (median age 8.4 years; range 0.2–18.0 years) attending hospital for the management of non-malignant disorders. Serum vitamin D (25-OH-D), parathormone levels and bone biochemistry were determined. Vitamin D status and its relationship to age, sex, ethnicity, time of sampling and presence of malignant disease was determined.
Results
Vitamin D status was suboptimal in 62% of cases (25-OH-D < 50 nmol/L [<20 ng/ml]). Vitamin D deficiency (25-OH-D?<25 nmol/L [<10ng/ml](<10ng/ml)) was more common in children with malignant disease than controls (21.3% vs. 3.3% ; P?=?0.013). Month of sampling (P?Items in both categories Cancer and Infant-Child :**
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