Abstract

Objective: This study aimed to assess the clinical and laboratory characteristics of patients infected with COVID-19, and to investigate the relationship between COVID-19 severity and their vitamin D levels.
Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted at the Ministry of National Guard Health Affairs, among a total of 471 COVID-19 patients who were infected during the years 2020 and 2021. Patients were identified through the infection control department, the intensive care unit, and medical records.
Results: The mean age of the study participants was 42 ± 10.28 years, with the majority of female cases (60%) occurring in the year 2020. Nearly half of the overall patients (49%) were admitted through the emergency department. There was no statistically significant association between low vitamin D levels and the severity of COVID-19 symptoms (p-value = 0.13). The most common symptoms across all patients were upper respiratory tract infections, including nasopharyngitis, tonsillitis, and otitis media, but were nearly twice as common in outpatients. Notably, muscle injury was the only symptom with a statistically significant association with vitamin D deficiency (p-value=0.031). Both males (n = 94) and females (n = 127) had moderate vitamin D deficiency, with females being significantly more vitamin D deficient than males (p-value = 0.018).
Conclusion: It was found that there was no significant correlation between reduced serum vitamin D levels and the severity of COVID-19 symptoms. Further multicenter studies on a larger scale are needed to clarify the role of vitamin D deficiency in the progression of COVID-19.

Key words: Vitamin D, COVID-19, severity, correlation, Saudi Arabia