Abstract
Vitamin D deficiency is a serious public health issue in the United Kingdom. Those at increased risk, such as pregnant women, children under 5 years and people from ethnic groups with dark skin, are not all achieving their recommended vitamin D. Effective vitamin D education is warranted. A qualitative study was undertaken to evaluate the acceptability and understanding of a vitamin D infographic, developed using recommendations from previous research. Fifteen parents/carers, recruited through local playgroups and adverts on popular parent websites, participated in focus groups and telephone interviews. The majority were female, White British and educated to degree level. A thematic analysis methodology was applied. The findings indicated that understanding and acceptability of the infographic were satisfactory, but improvements were recommended to aid interpretation and create more accessible information. These included additional content (what vitamin D is; other sources; its health benefits; methods/doses for administration and scientific symbols used) and improved presentation (eye-catching, less text, simpler language, more images and a logo). Once finalized, the infographic could be a useful tool to educate families around vitamin D supplementation guidelines, support the UK Healthy Start vitamins scheme and help improve vitamin D status for pregnant and lactating women and young children.
Highlights
Vitamin D is a hormone precursor that is synthesized in the skin during UVB radiation from sunlight exposure [1]
The infographic was developed in response to findings from previous research [13,42,43,47,48,50,51,55] that identified that there is poor awareness of vitamin D recommendations, which appears to be a barrier to vitamin D uptake, there is a need to aid education and improve awareness around vitamin D recommendations and there is a lack of informative and accessible vitamin D educational materials for parents
The findings revealed that the sample had some awareness of vitamin D in the context of obtaining it from sunlight, but there was a lack of awareness of how vitamin D needs can be adequately met, with some perceptions that dietary sources alone are sufficient to meet vitamin D requirements
Summary
Vitamin D is a hormone precursor that is synthesized in the skin during UVB radiation from sunlight exposure [1]. Most vitamin D is obtained through sunlight exposure [1,3]; dietary sources only account for between 10 and 20% of the body’s total store [4], as few foods contain vitamin D naturally and fortification of foods in the UK is limited [2,5]. Due to the presence of vitamin D receptors expressed in almost every tissue and cell, there have been a substantial number of investigations into the effects of vitamin D that are extra-skeletal [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15]. There are current investigations into the impact of vitamin D on COVID-19 [16], with recent systemic reviews and meta-analyses revealing that low serum 25(OH)D is significantly associated with a higher risk of COVID-19 infection and severity [17,18]
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