Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D], the major circulating form of vitamin D used for evaluating the vitamin D status of patients, has been associated with survival in a variety of cancers with conflicting evidence. We aimed to investigate this association in newly diagnosed advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients.
Vashi et al BMC Cancer (2015) 15:1012 DOI 10.1186/s12885-015-2043-x RESEARCH ARTICLE Open Access The relationship between circulating 25-hydroxyvitamin D and survival in newly diagnosed advanced non-small-cell lung cancer Pankaj G Vashi, Persis Edwin, Brenten Popiel and Digant Gupta* Abstract Background: Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D], the major circulating form of vitamin D used for evaluating the vitamin D status of patients, has been associated with survival in a variety of cancers with conflicting evidence We aimed to investigate this association in newly diagnosed advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients Methods: This was a consecutive cohort of 359 newly diagnosed stages III-IV NSCLC patients who underwent a baseline serum 25(OH)D evaluation prior to receiving any treatment at our institution between January 2008 and December 2010 We used the vitamin D categories of “deficient ( = 20 ng/ml)” Cox regression was used to evaluate the prognostic significance of serum 25(OH)D after adjusting for relevant confounders Results: Mean age at diagnosis was 57.4 years Of the 359 patients, 151 (42.1 %) were deficient in vitamin D at the time of diagnosis The median survival in deficient and not deficient cohorts was 11.7 and 12.8 months respectively (p = 0.06) Season of diagnosis, performance status, smoking status and hospital location significantly predicted vitamin D status On univariate Cox analysis, gender, stage of disease, hospital location, histologic subtype, subjective global assessment (SGA), performance status, smoking status, body mass index and serum albumin were significantly associated with survival (p