Vitamin D for the management of asthma (Review)

Martineau, Adrian R., Cates, Christopher J., Urashima, Mitsuyoshi, Jensen, Megan, Griffiths, Alex P., Nurmatov, Ulugbek ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9557-8635, Sheikh, Aziz and Griffiths, Chris J. 2016. Vitamin D for the management of asthma (Review). Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (9) , CD011511. 10.1002/14651858.CD011511.pub2

Preview

PDF - Published Version Download (695kB) | Preview

Abstract

Background: Several clinical trials of vitamin D to prevent asthma exacerbation and improve asthma control have been conducted in children and adults, but a meta‐analysis restricted to double‐blind, randomised, placebo‐controlled trials of this intervention is lacking. Objectives: To evaluate the efficacy of administration of vitamin D and its hydroxylated metabolites in reducing the risk of severe asthma exacerbations (defined as those requiring treatment with systemic corticosteroids) and improving asthma symptom control. Search methods: We searched the Cochrane Airways Group Trial Register and reference lists of articles. We contacted the authors of studies in order to identify additional trials. Date of last search: January 2016. Selection criteria: Double‐blind, randomised, placebo‐controlled trials of vitamin D in children and adults with asthma evaluating exacerbation risk or asthma symptom control or both. Data collection and analysis: Two review authors independently applied study inclusion criteria, extracted the data, and assessed risk of bias. We obtained missing data from the authors where possible. We reported results with 95% confidence intervals (CIs). Main results: We included seven trials involving a total of 435 children and two trials involving a total of 658 adults in the primary analysis. Of these, one trial involving 22 children and two trials involving 658 adults contributed to the analysis of the rate of exacerbations requiring systemic corticosteroids. Duration of trials ranged from four to 12 months, and the majority of participants had mild to moderate asthma. Administration of vitamin D reduced the rate of exacerbations requiring systemic corticosteroids (rate ratio 0.64, 95% CI 0.46 to 0.90; 680 participants; 3 studies; high‐quality evidence), and decreased the risk of having at least one exacerbation requiring an emergency department visit or hospitalisation or both (odds ratio (OR) 0.39, 95% CI 0.19 to 0.78; number needed to treat for an additional beneficial outcome, 27; 963 participants; 7 studies; high‐quality evidence). There was no effect of vitamin D on % predicted forced expiratory volume in one second (mean difference (MD) 0.48, 95% CI ‐0.93 to 1.89; 387 participants; 4 studies; high‐quality evidence) or Asthma Control Test scores (MD ‐0.08, 95% CI ‐0.70 to 0.54; 713 participants; 3 studies; high‐quality evidence). Administration of vitamin D did not influence the risk of serious adverse events (OR 1.01, 95% CI 0.54 to 1.89; 879 participants; 5 studies; moderate‐quality evidence). One trial comparing low‐dose versus high‐dose vitamin D reported two episodes of hypercalciuria, one in each study arm. No other study reported any adverse event potentially attributable to administration of vitamin D. No participant in any included trial suffered a fatal asthma exacerbation. We did not perform a subgroup analysis to determine whether the effect of vitamin D on risk of severe exacerbation was modified by baseline vitamin D status, due to unavailability of suitably disaggregated data. We assessed two trials as being at high risk of bias in at least one domain; neither trial contributed data to the analysis of the outcomes reported above. Authors' conclusions: Whilst we are confident that Vitamin D reduced the risk of asthma exacerbation in these trials (high quality GRADE assessment), we recognise that there is uncertainty about how these findings might be applied in practice. More research is needed to clarify whether there is a difference in effect between adults and children and with respect to asthma severity, baseline vitamin D status and doses.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Medicine
Publisher:	Wiley
ISSN:	1469-493X
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	20 October 2016
Date of Acceptance:	5 September 2016
Last Modified:	05 May 2023 16:13
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/95484

Citation Data

Cited 35 times in Scopus. View in Scopus. Powered By Scopus® Data

Actions (repository staff only)

Edit Item