The association of vitamin D and vitamin E levels at birth with bronchopulmonary dysplasia in preterm infants

BACKGROUND: Despite improvements made in neonatal care, bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) is still the most common respiratory disease in preterm infants. The relationship between the blood contents of vitamin D/E in premature infants and BPD is still controversial. METHODS: Preterm infants were recruited as the research subjects. On the basis of the inclusion and exclusion criteria, a total of 133 eligible cases were finally included. A total of 63 preterm infants with a clear diagnosis of BPD and 5 preterm infants who died before the diagnosis of BPD were in the case group, and 65 non-BPD preterm infants with equivalent baseline characteristics were in the control group. The BPD group included 38 cases in Grade Ⅰ, 18 cases in Grade Ⅱ, and 12 cases in Grade Ⅲ. The contents of vitamin D and E in the cord blood of different groups were detected by high-performance liquid chromatography and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Correlation analysis adopted the Pearson correlation analytic method. RESULTS: The serum vitamin D and E levels at birth were remarkably lower in the BPD group than the non-BPD group, both of which were also correlated with the severity of BPD. The vitamin D and E contents were negatively correlated with the oxygen support duration required for premature infants with BPD. CONCLUSION: This study deepens our understanding of the field of BPD pathogenesis by demonstrating an association between vitamin D/E deficiency and BPD severity, suggesting that vitamin D and E might have potential clinical value in the prognosis and treatment of BPD.