African American Women Don’t Need Larger Vitamin D Doses

US Pharm. 2013;38(3):7.

Omaha, NE—According to a recent double-blind study, African American women who are deficient in vitamin D should take the same dose taken by white women to treat the condition. In the study, older African American and white women of similar body size responded identically to vitamin D supplementation of varying doses, even though women with darker skin tones tend to have lower levels of the biomarker used to measure vitamin D levels (25OHD). Levels of 25OHD were similar between groups, suggesting that vitamin D absorption and metabolism are the same in African American and white women. It was concluded that lower levels of serum 25OHD in African Americans must be due to lower production of vitamin D in the skin.

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