Background
Vitamin D deficiency is common in older adults and has been implicated in psychiatric
and neurologic disorders. This study examined the relationship among vitamin D status,
cognitive performance, mood, and physical performance in older adults.
Methods
A cross-sectional group of 80 participants, 40 with mild Alzheimer disease (AD) and
40 nondemented persons, were selected from a longitudinal study of memory and aging.
Cognitive function was assessed using the Short Blessed Test (SBT), Mini-Mental State
Exam (MMSE), Clinical Dementia Rating (CDR; a higher Sum of Boxes score indicates
greater dementia severity), and a factor score from a neuropsychometric battery; mood
was assessed using clinician's diagnosis and the depression symptoms inventory. The
Physical Performance Test (PPT) was used to measure functional status. Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin
D levels were measured for all participants.
Results
The mean vitamin D level in the total sample was 18.58 ng/mL (standard deviation:
7.59); 58% of the participants had abnormally low vitamin D levels defined as less
than 20 ng/mL. After adjusting for age, race, gender, and season of vitamin D determination,
vitamin D deficiency was associated with presence of an active mood disorder (odds
ratio: 11.69, 95% confidence interval: 2.04–66.86; Wald χ2 = 7.66, df = 2, p = 0.022). Using the same covariates in a linear regression model,
vitamin D deficiency was associated with worse performance on the SBT (F = 5.22, df
= [2, 77], p = 0.044) and higher CDR Sum of Box scores (F = 3.20, df = [2, 77], p
= 0.047) in the vitamin D-deficient group. There was no difference in performance
on the MMSE, PPT, or factor scores between the vitamin D groups.
Conclusions
In a cross-section of older adults, vitamin D deficiency was associated with low mood
and with impairment on two of four measures of cognitive performance.
Key Words
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Article info
Publication history
Accepted:
July 14,
2006
Received in revised form:
July 8,
2006
Received:
April 18,
2006
Footnotes
This study was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health: K12 HD01459 (CHW), P01 AG03991 (JCM), P50 AG05681 (JCM); and the Alan A. and Edith L. Wolff Charitable Trust (CHW/JCM).
We thank Dr. Martha Storandt for providing the cognitive assessment data. We are also indebted to the Clinical and Genetics cores of the Alzheimer's Disease Research Center for providing the diagnostic data and serum used in this report.
Identification
Copyright
© 2006 American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
