Comparison of Zinc,Vitamin A &D Serum Levels Between Children With Respiratory Tract Infection And Healthy Individuals in two Iranian Referral Hospitals

Background and objective:Different factors influence the severity of respiratory infection such as causative pathogen and the host immune response. Vitamins and micronutrients play important roles in supporting immune system, and their homeostasis have a crucial importance in response to infections. Nutritional deprivation both for micronutrients and vitamins especially Zinc and vitamins A and D are particularly common in children of Middle East and Asia. This problem arises from their poor and inadequate diet besides the loss of nutrients in course of recurrent infections. Materials and methods:This was a cross-sectional trial on 25 patients, admitted to pediatric wards of two referral children hospitals in Tehran, Iran, due to acute respiratory tract infection, who were compared to 40 other patients admitted to surgical ward for elective surgery. 72% of the patients were male and 28% female. The average age was 2.17years. Serum levels of Zinc, vitamins A and D were measured in both groups using atomic methods, ELISA and spectrophotometry, respectively. Results:Despite the lower levels of vitamins A and D in cases than controls, the difference was not significant (p=0.4 and p=0.1, respectively). However, serum levels of Zinc were significantly lower in cases than controls (p=0.002). Conclusion:According to our trial, it seems administration of supplementary zinc and vitamin A might reduce patients’ vulnerability to respiratory tract infection. There was no such indication in regards for vitamin D supplementation, which could be due to the relatively low levels of this vitamin in the whole population.