Improvement in High-Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol Levels in Argentine Indian School Children after Vitamin D Supplementation

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Low vitamin D levels correlate with dyslipidemia, but limited data exist on indigenous children. The objective was to determine whether vitamin D supplementation improves high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) levels among Koya children. METHODS: A prospective 1-year study evaluated a treated cohort of 70 (38 males) children aged 10.3 ± 2.1 years who received 5,000 U of vitamin D weekly during 8 weeks, and a control group of 20 (8 males) children aged 9.2 ± 1.1 years who did not receive vitamin D. RESULTS/CONCLUSIONS: At baseline, 18 (20%) had severe vitamin D deficiency (<10 ng/ml), 66 (73.3%) had deficiency (10 to <20 ng/ml), and 6 (6.6%) had insufficiency (20 to <30 ng/ml). At baseline, there was no significant difference in the prevalence of hypovitaminosis D between groups. After 1 year, the prevalence of severe vitamin D deficiency decreased from 20 to 0%, and that of insufficiency increased from 6 to 19% (p < 0.001) only in the treated group. The prevalence of low HDL-C also decreased in the treated group only (35.7-5.7%; p < 0.01). Multiple linear regression analysis showed that treated children improved HDL-C levels by 4 mg/dl (R(2): 0.13) adjusted for confounding factors, suggesting that vitamin D supplementation among Indian children improved HDL-C levels.