Vitamin A deficiency among Moroccan women and children.

BACKGROUND

Vitamin A deficiency (VAD), attributable to an inadequate food intake, constitutes a problem in developing countries. The determination of plasma vitamin A (VA) is a reliable method for assessing VA status of the population. In this context, high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) has become the method of choice for VA analysis.

OBJECTIVES

We describe the VAD profile of Moroccan children and women, obtained by specific HPLC analysis of VA.

SUBJECTS AND

METHODS

The study involved 2457 participants: 1453 children and 1004 women from different areas of Morocco. Vitamin A was assessed by HPLC. Validation was conducted by comparison of the analysis of VA achieved in two laboratories.

RESULTS

The prevalence of VAD in children (n = 1453) was 40.4% [37.8% - 43.0%] against 10.9 % [8.4% - 14.1%] of women in the Gharb (n = 494) and 6.3 % [4.4% - 8.8%] in women of Doukkala (n = 510). The VA distribution of the children was low compared to distributions among women. Children had significantly lower VA levels (0.773 +/- 0.252 micromol/l) than women of Gharb (1.17 +/- 0.43 micromol/l) and women of Doukkala (1.308 +/- 0.453 micromol/l). Analytical performance was good: the reproducibility and recovery rates were respectively 1.97 % and 98.7 +/- 3.1 %. The comparison of the mean VA and the cases of VAD obtained by the two laboratories showed no significant difference.

CONCLUSION

Vitamin A deficiency is severe among children and moderate among women. The absence of the stratum having comfortable averages in vitamin A (plasma VA>3.49 micromol/l) indicates likely inadequate alimentary habits for a suitable vitamin A intake. The use of HPLC analysis of vitamin A, on a large scale for the first time in Morocco, has demonstrated that vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem. The recycling of mobile phase has reduced the costs of HPLC. This analytical method is useful in the evaluation of intervention programs against vitamin A deficiency and in future epidemiological studies.