Does vitamin D deficiency increase the risk of obesity in adults and the elderly? A systematic review of prospective cohort studies.

OBJECTIVES: Epidemiological studies indicate an association between vitamin D deficiency and obesity. However, there is no consistent evidence of the direction or causal relationship between these conditions. Thus, we analysed the longitudinal relationship between vitamin D deficiency and obesity/adiposity in different age groups.

STUDY DESIGN: This study was a systematic review with PROSPERO registry (CRD42016047523).

METHODS: Electronic searches were undertaken in Lilacs, Medline, Science Direct, Scopus and Web of Science databases until April 2020. For each study, we collected the frequency of vitamin D deficiency and obesity.

RESULTS: In total, 5071 articles were identified and 8 were ultimately included in this systematic review. Five cohort studies involved adults, two of which recorded a positive association between vitamin D deficiency and obesity. The other three studies found a borderline or null association between vitamin D deficiency and obesity. Three studies investigated the elderly population; two of these recorded an association between vitamin D and greater adiposity, and one study recorded that 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels ≥30 ng/ml were associated with less weight gain in the follow-up.

CONCLUSIONS: This review reports that the majority of studies included show that vitamin D deficiency can contribute to the occurrence of obesity in adults and the elderly. It is recommended that prospective studies are conducted, with varying age groups and weather conditions, designed to test the longitudinal relationship between vitamin D deficiency and obesity outcomes.