Vitamin D status in psychotic disorder patients and healthy controls – The influence of ethnic background

Abstract

Vitamin D deficiency is common among patients with psychotic disorders and could be due to unknown disease mechanisms or contingent factors. However most studies are performed in chronic patients and have often failed to address the influence of ethnicity on vitamin D levels in clinical samples. We investigated serum concentrations of 25-hydroxy vitamin D (S-25 OH D) in first episode patients compared to patients with multi episodes and healthy controls; with a specific focus on differences between visible ethnic minorities and participants from the majority population. A total of 284 participants were included in this cross-sectional study. First episode patients with a DSM-IV psychotic disorder were matched on age, gender and ethnicity to participants from a multi episode patient sample (1:1) and healthy controls (1:2). We did not find any differences between either patient groups or the healthy controls, but participants from visible ethnic minorities had significantly lower S-25 OH D than participants from the majority population. This implies that S-25 OH D should be routinely measured in persons from visible ethnic minorities since low levels are associated with higher levels of depressive symptoms.

Vitamin D Deficiency and Associated Factors in Patients with Mental Disorders Treated in Routine Practice

“…The difference, albeit with smaller magnitude, could be noticed for patients suffering from mental illnesses, too. Compared to our results, in some other societies there were much higher vitamin D serum levels and a lower prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in both in-and outpatients, including those with serious psychotic or depressive disorders (54)(55)(56). At present, the reasons for such differences are not completely understood but, at least in part, could be tied to the abovedescribed country's distinctions (20,21).…”

Vitamin D and clinical symptoms in First Episode Psychosis (FEP): A prospective cohort study

“…The lack of an association between vitamin D levels (both categorical and continuous) and negative symptoms of psychosis at baseline, but the identified association with negative symptoms at 12 months, raise the possibility that low vitamin D at onset of psychosis may be associated with the later emergence of negative symptoms. Like previous work in FEP, we failed to identify a cross sectional relationship between vitamin D levels and positive (Graham et al, 2015;Nerhus et al, 2015;Yee et al, 2016) or negative symptoms (Nerhus et al, 2015).…”

“…These findings were supported by a cross sectional study of 31 FEP patients, in which a similar inverse correlation between vitamin D levels and negative symptoms was identified (Yee et al, 2016). A somewhat larger study with 71 FEP patients did not identify significant correlations between vitamin D and psychotic symptoms, but did identify significant correlations with depressive symptoms (Nerhus et al, 2015). Associations with clinical state have been demonstrated in adolescents who are 3.5 times more likely to have psychotic symptoms when vitamin D deficient (Gracious et al, 2012).…”

Low vitamin D is associated with negative and depressive symptoms in psychotic disorders

“…From September 2012; total S-25(OH)D (a sum of 25(OH)D2 and 25(OH)D3) was determined using a liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) method developed at the Hormone laboratory (Oslo University Hospital, Aker) (Nerhus et al, 2015). Until September 2012, S-25(OH)D was measured by radioimmunoassay (RIA kit from Diasorin) (Holvik et al, 2005).…”