Suburban clustering of vitamin D deficiency in Melbourne, Australia

A high prevalence of mild to moderate vitamin D deficiency has been observed in women who have recently arrived from the horn of Africa and living in inner Melbourne. Vitamin D status of women with differ-ing age and ethnic distributions residing in other suburbs is unknown.

A tertiary referral Women's hospital-based survey of serum 25(OH)D concentrations in 2,690 women aged 14-78 years residing in Mel-bourne between 1 July 2004 and 30 June 2005. We computed odds of serum 25(OH)D concentrations<50 nmol/L and used tests of homogeneity across different suburbs in Melbourne, Victoria.

Women with moderate vitamin D deficiency from all suburbs were young [29.1+/-7.2 years (mean+/-standard deviation)]. The odds of moderate vitamin D deficiency were highest in inner suburbs and Greenvale, Coburg, Pascoe Vale South, Fawkner, Broadmeadows and Campbellfield from the Hume-Moreland municipality (p value for homogeneity of odds<0.001).

Vitamin D deficiency ap-pears to be a growing health concern in Australia and may be more prevalent in younger women in Victoria than anticipated.