Isolated vitamin D supplementation improves the immune-inflammatory biomarkers in younger postmenopausal women: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial.

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial looks at Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of vitamin D (VitD) supplementation on immune-inflammatory biomarkers in younger postmenopausal women.

Who Took Part

The study group was 160 women.

PubMed indexes the participants as middle-aged adults and older adults, women only.

The intervention time was 9 months, and the women were assessed at baseline and endpoint.

How the Study Was Run

The design is described as randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

Neither the women nor the staff measuring them knew who was on Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc, so expectations could not easily colour the readings.

A placebo (an inactive look-alike) gave the Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc group a baseline to be compared against.

Serum levels of interleukins (ILs)-1β, IL-5, IL-6, IL-10, IL-12ρ70, IL-17α, tumor necrosis factor-alpha, and interferon-gamma were determined by immunoassay.

Plasma concentrations of 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] were measured by high-performance liquid chromatography.

Per-protocol analysis was adopted as the statistical method using a gamma distribution and repeated measures design, followed by Wald's multiple comparisons test.

What Was Measured

PubMed files the paper under topics including Biomarkers, Dietary Supplements, Inflammation Mediators, Postmenopause, Vitamin D and Vitamins.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc in 160 women.

Its findings take up roughly 6 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 2018 (Menopause (New York, N.Y.)), a journal based in United States.

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