Pregnant women who are vitamin D deficient have five times the risk of suffering a potentially fatal condition known as preeclampsia, according to a new study conducted by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Health Sciences and published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism.
Preeclampsia is characterized by high blood pressure combined with elevated protein levels in the urine, and may also cause swelling of the hands and feet. It occurs in approximately 7 percent of all first pregnancies. Preeclampsia can cause generalized damage to the kidneys, liver or blood vessels. More seriously, it can progress into eclampsia, a potentially fatal condition that can cause seizures or severe damage to the blood, kidneys, liver, lungs and nervous system. Eclampsia may be the cause of 70 percent of deaths during pregnancy in
Researchers compared 15 women with preeclampsia with 220 women who had not developed the condition. The majority of the women in both groups were vitamin D deficient, with blood levels lower than 80 nanomoles per liter, but the women with preeclampsia had significantly lower vitamin D levels than the healthy women.
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