A Comparison of Vitamin A Status Among Elderly Chinese Population Between 2002 and 2012: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of the China National Nutrition and Health Survey

Abstract Objectives Vitamin A deficiency is recognized as a major public health nutrition issue in developing countries including China. It is one of the most common micronutrient deficiencies, yet vitamin A status of the elderly in China paucity of data since 2002. We sought to evaluate Chinese elderly aged 60 years and above in vitamin A status, and to compare vitamin A insufficiency between year 2002 and 2012. Methods We compared serum retinol concentrations from the China National Nutrition and Health Survey 2002 (CNNHS 2002), with CNNHS data collected during 2010 through 2012 (CNNHS 2010–2012). Complete data were available for 4933 elderly participants in CNNHS 2002 and 5613 elderly participants in CNNHS 2010–2012. Results The mean serum retinol concentration was 1.69 (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.68–1.71) μmol/L during CNNHS 2002 and increase to 1.98 (1.96–2.00) μmol/L during CNNHS 2010–2012. Compared with 2002, the vitamin A levels in the elderly across all region, gender and age groups showed an upward trend, with the difference being statistically significant (all P < 0.05). In 2012, the incidence of VAD in the elderly participants was higher than in 2002 (3.39vs1.46) (P < 0.001). However, the incidence of marginal VAD was lower than in 2002 (7.38vs8.62) (P = 0.019). VAD in those being large cities, small and medium-sized cities, rural area, male and female, aged 60–69 or 70–79 were higher than in 2002 (all P < 0.05), poor rural areas was significantly lower than in 2002 (P < 0.001). The prevalence of marginal VAD among the urban elderly in 2012 was higher than in 2002 (P < 0.05), whereas the prevalence was lower than that in 2002 among the rural elderly (P < 0.001). The prevalence of marginal VAD in the male elderly (P < 0.001) and in the 60–69 age group (P = 0.014) were lower than in 2002. Conclusions Our findings showed that vitamin A status among elderly was greatly improved by 10 years, but VAD remains a public health problem in the Chinese elderly population. Therefore, reducing the incidence of VAD is crucial to the health of the elderly in China. In particular, attention needs to be paid to the nutrition and health status of urban and ≥80 year elderly. Funding Sources This research was supported by the Special Fund for Health-scientific Research in the Public Interest (No. 20,120,212) from the National Health and Family Planning Commission of the People's Republic of China.