Investıgation of vitamin D levels in obsessive-compulsive disorder

BACKGROUND: The impact of vitamin D on obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) remains unknown. AIM: Studies suggest that vitamin D deficiency may be associated with neuropsychiatric diseases. The purpose of this study is to investigate vitamin D levels in those diagnosed with OCD. In addition, the relation between OCD symptom severity and serum vitamin D level is investigated. METHODS: About 174 patients newly diagnosed with OCD and 170 healthy volunteers were included in the study. Yale–Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (YBOCS) was used to assess the severity of OCD symptoms. Serum vitamin D levels of the two groups were compared. RESULTS: The serum vitamin D levels of the OCD group were found to be significantly lower than the control group. Serum vitamin D levels were negatively correlated with the obsession, compulsion, and total scale scores measured in YBOCS but there was no correlation between the serum vitamin D levels and illness duration of OCD patients. CONCLUSIONS: To the best of our knowledge, this is one of the first studies to investigate vitamin D levels in newly diagnosed adult OCD patients without comorbidities. Although our findings suggest that vitamin D may play a role in the pathophysiology of OCD, further studies are needed to support our findings.