Association between vitamin D and hypertension in people coming for health check up to a tertiary care centre in South India

INTRODUCTION: Vitamin D has many effects apart from its role in calcium metabolism and bone health. Vitamin D is derived from endogenous ultraviolet-B induced vitamin D synthesis in the skin, and the current high prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in India, can be attributed to lifestyle related low sunlight exposure. Identification of the vitamin D receptor (VDR) in almost all human cells, suggests a role in extra skeletal diseases. Studies have shown that vitamin D deficiency is an independent risk factor for hypertension. AIM: To evaluate the association between vitamin D and hypertension in people coming for health check up to a tertiary care center in South India. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Study was carried out as a cross sectional study in a tertiary care hospital in South India. Participants (520) were both males and females (337 males and 183 females), between the age group of 20-60 years attending the comprehensive health check up clinic of our hospital. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS: Statistical analysis was done using IBM SPSS statistics 20.0. RESULTS: Severe vitamin D deficiency was highly prevalent in people with hypertension than in people without hypertension (P value <0.001). CONCLUSION: Since India is a tropical country, till recently it was believed that vitamin D deficiency and its ill effects are uncommon. But it was found that, vitamin D deficiency was highly prevalent in people with hypertension in South India, emphasizing the need of early vitamin D supplementation. Therefore, to reduce cardiovascular morbidity, early identification of vitamin D deficiency and appropriate vitamin D supplementation may be of primary importance in population, especially like ours, having high prevalence.