Relation of Vitamin D level with otitis media in autistic children

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 children with special needs department, National Research Centre.

2 Department of human genetics and genome research institute, National Research center, Cairo.

Abstract

Background
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD), a disorder with a complex clinical presentation and an unknown etiopathogenesis. Immune dysfunction is suggested as a risk factor contributing to co-morbidities observed with ASD. Vitamin D plays a vital immunomodulatory role in bacterial and viral infections besides its newly emerging role in postnatal brain development.
Objective
This study aims to assess relation between vitamin D and otitis media (OM) in autistic children. OM can present additional challenges to autistic individuals.
Materials and methods
There were 91 participants in the study. They were split into three groups ranging in age from 2 to 12 years. The first group comprised 35 autistic children without OM, the second group comprised 35 autistic children with OM, and the third comprised 21 healthy controls. All 3 groups underwent otoscopy and tympanometry to assess middle ear functions and to investigate the presence of OM, measurement of the vitamin D concentration, CARS-2 for assessment of autism severity, and language assessment to determine their linguistic abilities.
Results and conclusion
Compared to healthy controls, children with ASD had considerably lower serum vitamin D levels. Additionally, children with ASD and OM had notably lower serum Vit D levels than children without ASD. On the other hand, neither the existence of OM nor serum vitamin D levels were correlated with linguistic ability or age.
Serum Vit D level may contribute to the immune modulation in autistic children and lower levels of Vit D might increase the chance of middle ear infections, but it was not correlated with autism severity or language age or verbal communication.

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