Cochrane review of Vitamin D and stunting will be ignoring 9 important concerns – Nov 2017

The effects of oral vitamin D supplementation on linear growth and non-communicable diseases among infants and children younger than five years of age

Extensive description of how the review of Randomized controlled trials will be conducted

Important concerns that they appear to be ignoring

  1. Vitamin D taken during pregnancy
  2. Type of vitamin D given
    Infants will reject Vitamin D oils which they cannot digest
    There are many other forms of vitamin, such as gut friendly and topical
  3. Cofactors which are known to improve growth – such as Magnesium and Omega-3
  4. How soon after birth were supplements started
    Day zero, day 10, month 1, month 12 . . .
  5. Extra vitamin D needed if infant is a preemie, unhealthy, etc,
  6. Does the dose size vary with infant weight
  7. Was the mother breastfeeding, and if so, was she supplementing
  8. If using formula, was the formula fortified - was the formula low fat (2.5 X less vitamin D gets into the infant)
  9. The vitamin D level achieved by the infant
    They appear to be only looking at dosing, and ignoring response to the dose
  10. Skin color of the infant - dark skin infants often need much larger doses
  11. Was the infant given enough time in the noon-day sun to generate Vitamin D (> 30 minutes a week)
  12. Was Calcium also given
  13. Will they be accounting for deaths in the non-supplemented infants?
  14. Will they include RCTs with loading doses, injections, monthly doses, etc?

See also VitaminDWiki

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