To evaluate the effect of Vitamin D supplementation on the heart, researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) assessed whether higher doses of the vitamin reduced the presence of two specific proteins in the blood known to indicate cardiac injury and strain.
The team’s analysis of data from a double-blind, randomized trial do not support the use of higher dose Vitamin D supplementation to reduce cardiovascular risk in adults with low blood levels of Vitamin D. The study is published in the American Journal of Preventative Cardiology.
Katharine W. Rainer, MD and colleagues analyzed data from the Study to Understand Fall Reduction and Vitamin D in You (STURDY), a double-blind, randomized trial that tested the effects of Vitamin D3 supplementation on fall risk among adults 70 years or older with low Vitamin D concentrations levels. A National Institute of Aging-sponsored trial, STURDY was conducted between July 2015 and March 2019.
Participants were randomized into one of four groups, receiving either 200, 1000, 2000, or 4000 international units (IU) per day of Vitamin D3 supplementation. Blood levels of the markers of cardiovascular disease were measured at baseline, and at three-, 12- and 24-month follow-up visits.
The investigators found that lower Vitamin D levels were associated with a baseline elevation in one marker of cardiovascular disease; however, Vitamin D supplementation failed to reduce either marker of cardiovascular disease over the two-year study period, regardless of dose. The findings were largely consistent regardless of participants' age, sex, race or participants’ history of cardiovascular disease including high blood pressure and/or diabetes.
