80% urban women vitamin D deficient

It is leading to lower backaches among people, says study

Hyderabad: The levels of Vitamin D among individuals in the country, especially in women, continue to remain deficient, recent studies have indicated. In the last few years, during and after the Covid pandemic, Vitamin D attracted a lot of attention due to its ability to improve immunity, in addition to its already known role in poor bone health, bone pain, fractures, and rickets in children, when its levels are insufficient.

Despite ample evidence that links Vitamin D to improving immunity, it appears that a majority of Indian women continue to suffer from its deficiency. The recent 2023 records from Vitamin D testing camps by Apollo Diagnostics reveal that approximately 80 per cent of urban women in India have low Vitamin D levels.

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To understand the correlation between low back pain and fractures and levels of Vitamin D among patients, the orthopaedic department of Hyderabad-based Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS) in recent years (2019-21) conducted two major Randomized Controlled Trials (RCT) studies that were published in the Journal of Clinical Orthopedics and Trauma by Elsevier.

In both the studies, which included nearly 100 patients each, the NIMS clinical teams led by senior orthopaedic, Dr Maheshwar Lakkireddy, indicated that severe deficiency of Vitamin D Hypovitaminosis D is a causative factor for lower backaches and it should be addressed to reduce osteoporosis, a medical condition in which bones become brittle, as people age.

Levels of Vitamin D below 30ng/ml are considered deficient and a study in 2023 highlighted that 87 per cent of women who suffer from body aches remain unaware of the link between body aches and poor bone health and turn to temporary pain relief. “We need about 20 minutes of sunlight with 40 per cent of our body exposed to the sun daily for adequate production of Vitamin D,” says Dr Siddharth Potluri, Orthopedician, Apollo Clinic, in a recent statement.

However, women do not get this sunlight exposure on a day-to-day basis, leading to Vitamin D deficiency and bone pain. They tend to rely on temporary analgesics that reduce the perception of pain but do not solve the problem of Vitamin D deficiency, the Apollo Diagnostics study in collaboration with Horlicks Women’s Plus in 2023, said.