Vitamin D supplements can speed up the process of healing severe burns, as well as prevent infections and scarring, a study has found for the first time.
In order to investigate the role of vitamin D in recovery from burn injuries, Janet Lord and Khaled Al-Tarrah from the Birmingham University in the UK, assessed the recovery progress over a year in patients with severe burns.
The study found that patients with higher levels of vitamin D had a better prognosis, with improved wound healing, fewer complications and less scarring.
Vitamin D is known to have antibacterial actions that may help combat infection and therefore aid in wound healing of burn patients, researchers said.
The data also showed that burns patients tend to have lower levels of vitamin D.
This suggests that vitamin D supplementation immediately following burn injury may have potent health benefits to the patient, including enhanced antimicrobial activity to prevent infection, and improved wound healing.
"Major burn injury severely reduces vitamin D levels and adding this vitamin back may be a simple, safe and cost- effective way to improve outcomes for burns patients, with minimal cost to NHS," said Lord.
"Low vitamin D levels were associated with worse outcomes in burn patients including life threatening infections, mortality and delayed wound healing," she said
"It was also associated with worse scarring, but vitamin D levels are something generally overlooked by clinicians," she added.
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