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Is vitamin D deficiency associated with retinopathy in type 2 diabetes mellitus? A case-control study
Maryam Zahedi1, Mohammad Mehdi Motahari2, Farima Fakhri3
1Department of Internal Medicine, Endocrine and Metabolic Disease, The Clinical Research Development Unit (CRDU), 5 Azar Hospital, Golestan University of Medical Sciences, Gorgan, Iran.
Background And Aims:
This study aimed to determine the associations between vitamin D deficiency and diabetic retinopathy (DR) progression risk in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) patients.
Methods:
This is a case-control study that enrolled 201 diabetic retinopathy (DR) patients as case and 201 T2DM without DR as a control. Demographic variables were obtained during an interview using a questionnaire, furthermore, anthropometric measures were evaluated based on the standard protocol. In addition, biochemical indices including 25-hydroxyvitamin D, fasting blood glucose (FBG), insulin, Glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c), total cholesterol (TC), LDL-C, HDL-C, and triglyceride (TG) were assessed for all of the participants. Multivariate logistic regression was performed to estimate the relationship between vitamin D and retinopathy.
Results:
Based on the statistical analysis of age, sex, and BMI there was no significant difference between the two groups, while the mean concentration of 25-hydroxyvitamin D substantially was lower in case group in comparison with the control group (14.46 VS. 19.88). Furthermore, low levels of vitamin D are associated with DR and consequently proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR) in patients with T2DM.
Conclusion:
Totally based on the results of the present study vitamin D deficiency increased the risk of RD in patients with T2DM, also in case of deficiency of this nutrient, retinopathy may develop into PDR type.
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