Risk Factors for Maternal Vitamin D Deficiency within the United Arab Emirates

Izzeldin Hussein, Zainab Taha, Ihab Tewfik, Salah Badawi, Hisham Siddieg, Amanda Rodrigues Amorim Adegboye, Kyle McGrady

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Abstract

Introduction: Vitamin D deficiency during pregnancy is a public health problem and it has been associated with negative pregnancy outcomes for both mothers and infants. Aim: To estimate the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in pregnant women in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and to identify the contribution of risk factors to the 25(OH)D levels. Methods: It is a cross-sectional study in which vitamin D levels of 1088 adult pregnant women were assessed. Information on vitamin D intake was available in a sub-sample of 266 women. Results: The mean serum 25(OH)D was 26.2 nmol/L (95% CI 25.2-27.1 range 5-129.1 nmol/L) with 69% of women being vitamin D deficient (<30 nmol/L). In the bivariate analysis, showed that no predictors could have been indicated as no values exceeded significance (p<0.2). Stepwise multiple linear regression analysis could not be applied to identify predictors of vitamin D levels as no values exceeded p=0.2. Conclusion: Due to the high prevalence of vitamin deficiency in UAE, there is an urge for interventions focusing on supplementation, fortification and diet diversity for preventing health consequences during a critical period of development.
Original languageEnglish
Article number1000276
Number of pages8
JournalJournal of Pregnancy and Child Health
Volume3
Issue number5
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 30 Sept 2016
Externally publishedYes

Bibliographical note

© 2016 Izzeldin H, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Keywords

  • Vitamin D
  • Pregnancy
  • United Arab Emirates
  • Crosssectional study

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