Is There an Association Between Inflammation and Serum-Vitamin D? – Results of a Retrospective Analysis of Hospitalized Geriatric Patients

Lukas Funk, Ulrike Sonja Trampisch, Maryam Pourhassan, Rainer Wirth Department of Geriatric Medicine, Marien Hospital Herne, Herne, GermanyCorrespondence: Lukas Funk Marien Hospital Herne, Universitätsklinikum der Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Herne, Hölkeskampring, 4044629, Deutschland, Tel +49 (0) 2323 499 5822, Email Lukas.Funk@rub.dePurpose: Vitamin D deficiency is a common finding in geriatric patients. The ESPEN micronutrient guideline states that vitamin D serum levels significantly decrease in the presence of inflammation and should be interpreted with caution. This is of great interest for hospital care and would imply a significant change to the current approach to hospitalized patients with suspected vitamin D deficiency.Patients and methods: To evaluate the association of vitamin D and inflammation, we reanalyzed the data set of serum 25(OH)D-Levels of 687 consecutive geriatric hospitalized patients of a previously published study.Results: We found that vitamin D deficiency (< 20 ng/dl) was prevalent in 78.0% and vitamin D insufficiency (20– 30 ng/dl) in 9.9% of patients. Sperman’s correlation showed a significant but very weak correlation (R = − 0.100, P < 0.01) of serum vitamin D and C-reactive protein. However, linear regression with the inclusion of age and gender revealed no significant association (beta-coefficient − 0.070; p=0.067).Conclusion: In this study, we could not confirm a significant and clinically relevant association between serum vitamin D levels and inflammation, contrasting with a previous study. However, longitudinal studies need to be performed to draw a final conclusion.Keywords: Vitamin D, 25-hydroxyvitamin D, inflammation, older, C-reactive protein, geriatric