Adequate vitamin D levels are important for maintaining kidney transplant recipients’ health, according to a study that will be presented at ASN Kidney Week 2013 November 5-10 at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, GA.
In the study that included 264 kidney transplant recipients, researchers led by Yoshitsugu Obi, MD, PhD (Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine, in Japan) measured patients’ baseline blood levels of vitamin D and examined their links with kidney function decline, rejection episodes, and death.
Vitamin D levels had an almost linear relationship with annual kidney function decline. Also, with vitamin D sufficiency (?20 ng/mL) as the reference, vitamin D inadequacy (?12 and
“Low vitamin D predicts adverse allograft outcomes, and vitamin D supplementation early after kidney transplantation may improve patient outcome,†the authors concluded.
Explore further: Low vitamin D linked with lower kidney function after transplantation
More information: Study: “Low Vitamin D and Adverse Allograft Outcomes in Kidney Transplant Recipients (Abstract 1603)