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[Is vitamin D supplementation effective for the prevention of falls in elderly people?]
Franco Scheel1, Marcela Carrasco2
1Facultad de Medicina, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile; Proyecto Epistemonikos, Santiago, Chile. Address: Facultad de Medicina, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Lira 63, Santiago Centro, Chile.
Abstract:
Falls in elderly people are common and come with important effects on morbidity and mortality, dependence and institutionalization. It has been proposed that supplementation of vitamin D could prevent the occurrence of this event. Searching in Epistemonikos database, which is maintained by screening 30 databases, we identified 18 systematic reviews including 31 randomized trials. We combined the evidence using meta-analysis and generated a summary of findings table following the GRADE approach. We concluded the use of vitamin D probably leads to little or no difference in the risk of falling in elderly people.
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