The association between vitamin D status and inflammatory bowel disease among children and adolescents: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Somaye Fatahi; Naseem Alyahyawi; Naryman Albadawi; Farzaneh Mardali; Naghi Dara; Mohammad Hassan Sohouli; Kousalya Prabahar; Pejman Rohani; Nazanin Koushki; Aliakbar Sayyari; Amir Hossein Hosseini; Ahmed Abu-Zaid

doi:10.3389/fnut.2022.1007725

The association between vitamin D status and inflammatory bowel disease among children and adolescents: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Front Nutr. 2023 Jan 9:9:1007725. doi: 10.3389/fnut.2022.1007725. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Nutrition Research Center, Research Institute for Children's Health, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
² Department of Nutrition, School of Public Health, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
³ Department of Pediatrics, King Abdulaziz University Hospital, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
⁴ Department of Medicine, King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Center, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
⁵ Student Research Committee, Department of Clinical Nutrition and Dietetics, Faculty of Nutrition and Food Technology, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
⁶ Department of Pharmacy Practice, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Tabuk, Tabuk, Saudi Arabia.
⁷ Pediatric Gastroenterology and Hepatology Research Center, Pediatrics Centre of Excellence, Children's Medical Center, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
⁸ College of Medicine, Alfaisal University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Abstract

Aim: Vitamin D deficiency is very common among children with IBD. Since there are conflicting results regarding the association of vitamin D with IBD, we conducted this systematic review to confirm the association of vitamin D with IBD.

Methods: We conducted a systematic search in Scopus, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, PubMed, and Google Scholar to find relevant studies. Articles with cross-sectional and case-control designs that reported the association between vitamin D and IBD among children were included.

Results: Eventually, 9 studies (with 16 effect sizes) reported the mean and SD or the median and the interquartile range of serum vitamin D levels in both subjects with IBD and control subjects. The random effects meta-analysis revealed that subjects with IBD had -1.159 ng/ml (95% CI: -2.783, 0.464) lower serum vitamin D concentrations compared with their healthy counterparts, but this difference was not significant. A total of 14 studies (with 18 effect sizes) with 2,602 participants provided information for the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency or insufficiency in patients with IBD as 44% (95% CI: 0.34-0.54) with significant heterogeneity noted among studies (p < 0.001; I² = 97.31%).

Conclusion: This systematic and meta-analysis study revealed that vitamin D deficiency was associated with IBD. Longitudinal studies should be conducted in the future to confirm our findings. Large randomized controlled trials assessing the doses of supplementation of vitamin D would provide a better understanding of the association between vitamin D and IBD.

Keywords: children; inflammatory bowel disease (IBD); supplement; systematic review; vitamin D.

Publication types

Systematic Review

Grants and funding

This article is taken from the disease registry, titled Registration of inflammatory bowel diseases in children and with code number IR.SBMU.RETECH.REC.1397.1199 from the ethics committee, which was supported by the deputy of research and technology at Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences (http://dregistry.sbmu.ac.ir).