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Association of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D concentrations with all-cause and cause-specific mortality among individuals with diabetes mellitus

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posted on 2020-11-03, 22:33 authored by Zhenzhen Wan, Jingyu Guo, An Pan, Chen Chen, Liegang Liu, Gang Liu
Objective: The evidence regarding vitamin D status and mortality among diabetes is scarce. This study aimed to examine the association of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] concentrations with all-cause and cause-specific mortality among adults with diabetes mellitus.

Research Design and Methods: This study included 6329 adults with diabetes from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES III) and NHANES 2001-2014. Death outcomes were ascertained by linkage to National Death Index records through 31 December 2015. Cox proportional hazard models were used to estimate hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence (CIs) for mortality from all causes, cardiovascular disease (CVD), and cancer.

Results: The weighted mean (95% CI) level of serum 25(OH)D was 57.7 (56.6, 58.8) nmol/L, and 46.6% had deficient vitamin D (<50 nmol/L [20 ng/mL]). Higher serum 25(OH)D levels were significantly associated with lower levels of glucose, insulin, HOMA-IR, HbA1c, blood lipids, and C-reactive protein at baseline (all Ptrend<0.05). During 55126 person-years of follow-up, 2056 deaths were documented, including 605 CVD deaths and 309 cancer deaths. After multivariate adjustment, higher serum 25(OH)D levels were significantly and linearly associated with lower all-cause and CVD mortality: there was a 31% reduced risk of all-cause mortality and a 38% reduced risk of CVD mortality per one unit increment in natural log-transformed 25(OH)D (both P<0.001). Compared with participants with 25(OH)D <25 nmol/L, the multivariate-adjusted HRs and 95% CI for participants with 25(OH)D >75 nmol/L were 0.59 (0.43, 0.83) for all-cause mortality (Ptrend=0.003), 0.50 (0.29, 0.86) for CVD mortality (Ptrend=0.02), and 0.49 (0.23, 1.04) for cancer mortality (Ptrend=0.12).

Conclusions: In a nationally representative sample of US adults with diabetes, higher serum 25(OH)D levels were significantly associated with lower all-cause and CVD mortality. These findings suggest that maintaining adequate vitamin D status may lower mortality risk in individuals with diabetes.

Funding

Dr. Pan was supported by the National Nature Science Foundation of China (81930124), and Hubei Province Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars (2018CFA033). The funders had no role in the design and conduct of the study, in the collection, analysis, and interpretation of the data, or in the preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript.

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