Assessment of Vitamin A and E Status in Korean Rural Adult Population by Dietary Intake and Serum Levels

Abstract

Because the intake of vitamin A had been consistently found to be low among Koreans, there has been a concern that mild vitamin A deficiency might be prevalent in the population. However, the inaccuracy of vitamin A database has long been suspected to be a contributor for low vitamin A intake. Vitamin E intake of Koreans has not been reported because of lack of a comprehensive database for the nutrient. This study was performed to assess the vitamin A and E status in 208 adults over 20 years of age living in a rural area of Korea. Newly modified database for vitamin A and E was used to estimate the dietary intake of the subjects in this study. A cross sectional survey of dietary intake with 24-hour recall method was conducted. Serum retinol and α-tocopherol levels of the subjects were analyzed in fasting samples using HPLC. For vitamin A, mean levels of dietary intake and percent of RDA were 620.3±1087RE/day and 88.6±155.4%, respectively, which were considerably higher than the levels reported in 1995 Korean National Nutrition survey(470.1RE/day and 67.2%, respectively). For vitamin E, the levels were 9.74±6.30mg/day and 97.4±63.0%, respectively. Mean concentration of serum retinol was 83.1±30.1㎍/dl and none of the subjects was below 10㎍/dl, or deficient level. Mean serum retinol in men, 99.8±30.4μg/dl, was significantly higher than in women, 70.7±23.4㎍/dl (p<0.01). Mean concentration of serum α-tocopherol was 1.17±0.52mg/dl and that of one subject was below 0.5mg/dl, or deficient level. Serum α-tocopherol levels of the old subjects were higher than the younger subjects in both sexes(p<0.05). These data suggest that contrary to the previous reports about low intake of vitamin A, intake and serum levels of vitamin A among the subjects are not low. Also, in this study, intake and serum levels of vitamin E are not low, either.