Prevalence of Vitamin D Deficiency in Nonspecific Musculoskeletal Pain

Abstract

Background: Vitamin D deficiency is common in all age groups throughout the world, and results in abnormalities in calcium, phosphorous and bone metabolism that can lead to muscle weakness, osteomalacia and osteopenia. Objectives: This study was designed to investigate the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in patients with nonspecific pain for whom no specific causes such as trauma, infection, tumor, and inflammatory disorders could be identified. Patients and Methods:This cross-sectional study included 438 patients with nonspecific musculoskeletal pain seen at our clinic. After evaluating their vitamin D status, we treated two groups of patients: those with vitamin D deficiency (< 20 ng/mL) and those with insufficiency (20 -29 ng/mL). We treated our patients with 50,000 units of vitamin D every week for 6 -8 weeks. After treatment we evaluated pain relief of patient and level of 25 hydroxi vitamin D. Results: A total of 438 patients (52 men and 386 women) participated in the study. There was no statistically significant correlation between sex and symptoms. Deficiency was more frequent in females but the difference compared to males was not statistically significant. Approximately half of the patients (47%) comprised the vitamin D-deficient group. Most patients (86.5%) had insufficient or deficient levels (< 30 ng/mL) of vitamin D. The most prevalent vitamin D status in men was insufficiency, whereas the most prevalent status in women was deficiency. Spearman's correlation coefficient showed weak positive correlations between vitamin D status and the number of pregnancies (r = 0.14). More than 90% of our patients reported that pain and muscle weakness responded to treatment after 3 weeks. Conclusions: Because osteomalacia is a common cause of persistent, nonspecific musculoskeletal pain, screening all patients with these symptoms for hypovitaminosis D should be standard practice in clinical care.