Nutritional status of patients with biliary atresia and autoimmune hepatitis related to serum levels of vitamins A, D and E

CONTEXT: Chronic liver disease may induce to malabsorption of lipids and fat-soluble vitamins, leading to injury of nutritional status. OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the nutritional status of pediatric-age patients with autoimmune hepatitis and biliary atresia related to serum levels of vitamins A, D and E and the disease severity. METHODS: This controlled transverse study, evaluated the patients with autoimmune hepatitis and biliary atresia and a reference group paired by sex and age. The patients underwent anthropometric evaluation, alimentary inquiry and determination of serum levels of vitamins A, D and E by high performance liquid chromatography. The Mann-Whitney test, Spearman correlation coefficients and variance analysis (ANOVA) were utilized for data treatment, regarding significant difference if P<0.05. RESULTS: The highest nutritional deficit was observed in patients with biliary atresia, mainly with cholestasis. The serum levels of vitamins A and E for the reference group changed as a function of age. The serum levels of vitamins A, D and E were higher in reference group than in patients with biliary atresia and autoimmune hepatitis together or separately. There were not difference in the serum levels of vitamins A, D and E between biliary atresia groups with cholestasis and without cholestasis. It was verified correlation between weight/age, triceps skinfold thickness, subscapular skinfold thickness, midarm circumference, midarm fat area values and vitamin A serum levels, as well as between all anthropometric indicators and vitamin E in patients with autoimmune hepatitis and biliary atresia. CONCLUSION: The patients with biliary atresia and cholestasis presented the highest nutritional injury. The patients with biliary atresia and autoimmune hepatitis presented lower serum levels of vitamins A, D and E that in control group. There is a directly proportional correlation between vitamin serum levels, mainly vitamin E, and all anthropometric variables of biliary atresia and autoimmune hepatitis groups.

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Saron,Margareth L. G., Godoy,Helena T., Hessel,Gabriel
Format: Digital revista
Language:English
Published: Instituto Brasileiro de Estudos e Pesquisas de Gastroenterologia e Outras Especialidades - IBEPEGE. 2009
Online Access:http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0004-28032009000100016
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