Date of this Version
9-2-2014
Document Type
Article
Abstract
Objective: To determine whether low vitamin D concentrations are associated with an increased risk of incident all-cause dementia and Alzheimer disease. Methods: One thousand six hundred fifty-eight elderly ambulatory adults free from dementia, cardiovascular disease, and stroke who participated in the US population?based Cardiovascular Health Study between 1992?1993 and 1999 were included. Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25(OH)D) concentrations were determined by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry from blood samples collected in 1992?1993. Incident all-cause dementia and Alzheimer disease status were assessed during follow-up using National Institute of Neurological and Communicative Disorders and Stroke/Alzheimer's Disease and Related Disorders Association criteria. Results: During a mean follow-up of 5.6 years, 171 participants developed all-cause dementia, including 102 cases of Alzheimer disease. Using Cox proportional hazards models, the multivariate adjusted hazard ratios (95% confidence interval [CI]) for incident all-cause dementia in participants who were severely 25(OH)D deficient (<25 nmol/L) and deficient (?25 to <50 nmol/L) were 2.25 (95% CI: 1.23?4.13) and 1.53 (95% CI: 1.06?2.21) compared to participants with sufficient concentrations (?50 nmol/L). The multivariate adjusted hazard ratios for incident Alzheimer disease in participants who were severely 25(OH)D deficient and deficient compared to participants with sufficient concentrations were 2.22 (95% CI: 1.02?4.83) and 1.69 (95% CI: 1.06?2.69). In multivariate adjusted penalized smoothing spline plots, the risk of all-cause dementia and Alzheimer disease markedly increased below a threshold of 50 nmol/L. Conclusion: Our results confirm that vitamin D deficiency is associated with a substantially increased risk of all-cause dementia and Alzheimer disease. This adds to the ongoing debate about the role of vitamin D in nonskeletal conditions.
Originally Published In
Neurology
PMID
25098535
DOI
10.1212/WNL.0000000000000755
Recommended Citation
Littlejohns, Thomas J.; Henley, William E.; Lang, Iain A.; Annweiler, Cedric; Beauchet, Olivier; Chaves, Paulo H.M.; Fried, Linda; Kestenbaum, Bryan C.; Kuller, Lewis H.; Langa, Kenneth M.; Lopez, Oscar L.; Kos, Katarina; Soni, Maya; and Llewellyn, David J., "Vitamin D and the risk of dementia and Alzheimer disease" (2014). All Faculty. 64.
https://digitalcommons.fiu.edu/all_faculty/64
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.