Vitamin D Status in Inpatients Admitted to an Internal Medicine Department

Background/Aims: A roleof hypovitaminosis D has been advocated in several medical conditions. We investigated vitamin D status in medical inpatients, compared to a blood donors’ group from the same area. Methods: Fifty-nine consecutive medical patients were recruited at hospital admission, concomitantly to 207 blood donors of both genders. Serum calcium, albumin, phosphate, creatinine, alkaline phosphatase total activity, 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] and parathyroid hormone (PTH) were assessed from April to May 2005. Results: In patients, 25(OH)D values were lower (13.1 ± 9.2 vs. 16.3 ± 8.5 ng/ml; p < 0.02) and PTH values higher (73.9 ± 77.7 vs. 53.4 ± 24.3 pg/ml; p < 0.01) than in controls, whose mean age was lower (62.5 ± 14.5 vs. 45.8 ± 15.6 years, p < 0.01). Such differences were not confirmed when comparing patients to a subgroup of age and sex-matched controls drawn from the whole sample of blood donors. In both patients and controls there was a trend towards a negative correlation between 25(OH)D and age and a positive correlation between PTH and age. The prevalence of 25(OH)D