Effects of zinc supplementation on 1- to 5-year old children.

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc, published as a randomized controlled trial.

To assess the impact of zinc supplementation on nutritional and biochemical parameters among children aged 12 to 59 months.

The following parameters were used to assess the nutritional status: weight-for-height and height-for-age expressed as z scores, according to National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) standards, biochemical measurements of serum iron and serum zinc, and hemoglobin and hematocrit levels.

Who Took Part

The study group was 58 children.

The age groups tagged for this paper are infants and young children, both men and women.

A blinded randomized clinical trial was carried out with 58 children aged 12 to 59 months included in the Programa Governamental de Combate a Carências Nutricionais (National Child Nutritional Program), which provided them with 2 kg of iron-fortified milk.

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized, single-blind and placebo-controlled study.

Because people in this Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc study were split into groups at random, differences between the groups are less likely to reflect who happened to join each one.

In this single-blind Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc study one party knew the assignments and the other did not.

Some children received a placebo instead of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc, giving a reference point.

What Was Measured

PubMed files the paper under topics including Anemia, Body Height, Brazil, Chi-Square Distribution, Dietary Supplements, Hematocrit and Hemoglobins.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, single-blind and placebo-controlled study of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc in 58 children.

The abstract goes on to report its results in about 5 sentences; this page does not restate them, so read the paper for the findings and their limits.

The publication is from 2006 (Jornal de pediatria), a journal based in Brazil.

More context: the Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc compound page, all human trials.