Minnesota rickets. Need for a policy change to support vitamin D supplementation

Vitamin D deficiency rickets, once considered the most common disease of early childhood, was reported to have disappeared by the 1960s. However, during a recent 18-month period, seven cases of nutritional rickets were diagnosed in the Twin Cities metropolitan area. All of the patients were born at term and were breastfed without supplementation vitamins. Three of the patients were Caucasian, three were African American, and one was biracial. This case series demonstrates the risk of nutritional rickets in breastfed infants in our northern climate, regardless of race. In hopes of eradicating this completely preventable disease, we advocate a uniform policy of vitamin D supplementation to breastfed infants.