TITLE:
Vitamin D Status in Healthy Children Aged 6 to 59 Months at the Pikine-Guediawaye Institute of Social Pediatrics, Dakar Suburbs (Senegal)
AUTHORS:
Babacar Niang, Aliou Ndongo, Aminata Mbaye, Serigne Saliou Mbacke, Ablaye Ndiaye, Khadidatou Diouf, Abou Ba, Abdallah Diallo, Djibril Boiro, Oulimata Ndiaye, Ousmane Ndiaye
KEYWORDS:
Vitamin D Deficiency, Children, Supplementation
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Pediatrics,
Vol.15 No.1,
January
20,
2025
ABSTRACT: Introduction: Vitamin D plays a key role in phosphocalcic metabolism, in normal functioning of the immune system and in the prevention of certain forms of cancer. Systematic vitamin D supplementation has been implemented in most Western countries, which has drastically reduced the prevalence of rickets. In Senegal, a country with enough sunshine, no large-scale data exists on vitamin D deficiency in children. In addition, there are no guidelines from the Ministry of Health and Social Action (MoHSA) on vitamin D supplementation. Our objective was to determine the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in children aged 6 to 59 months and to analyze the factors associated with it at the Institute of Social Pediatrics in Pikine-Guédiawaye, a suburb of Dakar. Patients and Methods: This was a prospective, descriptive and analytical cross-sectional study over a 3-month period (from January to March 2024) at the Institute of Social Pediatric (IPS) of Pikine-Guédiawaye. The study population consisted of all children aged 6 to 59 months free from any acute or chronic pathology, whose parents had agreed to answer the questionnaires after having consented and signed the consent and children who had had a sample taken for vitamin D dosage. Results: We included 102 children, 35 of whom had vitamin D deficiency, i.e. a prevalence of 34.31% with a slight male predominance (sex ratio 1.05). Infants aged 13 - 24 months were more affected (41.67%), but the difference was not statistically significant (p-value = 0.385). Patients with acute malnutrition had a significantly higher prevalence of vitamin D deficiency (54.17% of cases versus 28.38%) in those without acute malnutrition (p = 0.02). On the other hand, chronic malnutrition, underweight and diversification foods were not significantly associated with vitamin D deficiency (p of 0.60, 0.42 and 0.09 respectively). Conclusion: Vitamin deficiency affects one-third of apparently healthy children under 5 and this deficiency has no significant relationship with diversification foods. This suggests that the observed vitamin D deficiencies are less related to diet than to lack of sun exposure.