Vitamin D supplementation and fracture incidence in elderly persons. A randomized, placebo-controlled clinical trial.

What Was Tested

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

Who Took Part

The study group was 1916 women.

PubMed indexes the participants as older adults and people over 80, both men and women.

2578 persons (1916 women, 662 men) 70 years of age and older (mean age +/- SD, 80 +/- 6 years) living independently, in apartments for elderly persons, or in homes for elderly persons.

Dietary calcium intake and serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] were estimated in a subset of participants.

How the Study Was Run

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

The women were allocated by chance, so the Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc group and the comparison group should start out alike.

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.

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

Community setting (Amsterdam and surrounding area).

During follow-up, attention was concentrated on hip fractures and other peripheral fractures.

The maximal follow-up period was 4 years.

The results were evaluated by survival analysis.

What Was Measured

The subject headings attached to it are Calcium, Dietary, Fractures, Bone, Hip Fractures, Hydroxycholecalciferols, Osteoporosis, Patient Compliance and Survival Analysis.

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 1916 women.

With several hundred people or more, it is a fairly large study for this kind of research.

Its findings take up roughly 7 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 1996 (Annals of internal medicine), a journal based in United States.

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