New study shows that vitamin D can help improve heart disease

Heart failure affects about 900,000 people in the UK and more than 23 million worldwide. Research by the University of Leeds has found that daily dose of natural vitamin D, known as vitamin D3, improves heart function in people with chronic heart failure.  Dr Klaus Witte, who led the study from Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, said “This is a significant breakthrough for patients. It is the first evidence that vitamin D3 can improve heart function of people with heart muscle weakness – known as heart failure. “These findings could make a significant difference to the care of heart failure patients.”

The study, known as VINDICATE, (VitamIN D Treating patIents With Chronic heArT failurE), involved more than 160 existing patients being treated for heart failure using known treatments such as ACE-inhibitors, beta-blockers and pacemakers.

Study participants were asked to either take vitamin D3 or a dummy (placebo) tablet for one year. The patients who took vitamin D3 experienced an improvement in heart function, whereas those who took a placebo did not.

Heart function changes were measured using cardiac ultrasound (known as an echocardiogram). This scan can measure how much blood pumps from the heart with each heartbeat, known as ejection fraction. In heart failure patients, the ejection fraction is often significantly impaired – in the patients enrolled into the VINDICATE study the average ejection fraction was 26%. The ejection fraction of a healthy person is usually between 60% and 70%.

In the 80 patients who took Vitamin D3, the heart’s pumping function improved from 26% to 34%. In the others, who took placebo, there was no change in cardiac function. Meaning that for some heart disease patients, taking vitamin D3 regularly may lessen the need for them to be fitted with an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD), a device which detects dangerous irregular heart rhythms and can shock the heart to restore a normal rhythm.

“ICDs are expensive and involve an operation” said Dr Witte. “If we can avoid an ICD implant in just a few patients, then that is a boost to patients and the NHS as a whole.”

One key aspect of this study is that the researchers avoided using a calcium-based supplement, as calcium can cause further problems for heart failure patients.

The condition can affect people of all ages, but it is more common in older people – more than half of all people globally with heart failure are over the age of 75. In the UK, people over 65 are advised to take 10 microgram supplements of the vitamin.

Read More:

http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk/projects?ref=MR/J00281X/1