Serum vitamin C levels and their correlation with chronic kidney disease in adults: a nationwide study

Abstract

Introduction

Inflammation and oxidative stress play significant roles in the development of chronic kidney disease (CKD). Given the recognized antioxidant properties of vitamin C, our study aimed to explore the correlation between CKD and serum vitamin C levels.

Methods

Data were gathered from the 2017–2018 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Participants below 18 years of age, pregnant individuals, those lacking essential data for CKD diagnosis, or individuals with incomplete serum vitamin C data were excluded. Subgroup and weighted multivariable logistic regression analyses were performed to assess the potential correlation between serum vitamin C and CKD.

Results

Our study comprised 4969 participants, revealing an overall CKD prevalence of 15.0%. The results indicated that individuals with reduced serum vitamin C levels were more likely to be male, possess lower educational attainment, have a diminished poverty-income ratio, engage in heavy drinking, and be current smokers. Additionally, they exhibited a higher prevalence of obesity and diabetes. Significantly, participants in the third quartile group experienced a 37.0%, 47.0%, and 46.6% decrease in the risk of developing albuminuria, low estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR), and CKD, respectively. Subgroup analysis demonstrated that individuals between 65 and 80 years of age showed a statistically reduced risk of developing CKD and low eGFR when their serum vitamin C levels fell in the third and fourth quartile groups.

Conclusions

Our findings reveal a correlation between elevated serum vitamin C levels and a decreased risk of developing albuminuria, low eGFR, and CKD. Appropriately increasing serum vitamin C levels may hold promise in protecting renal function, particularly among older individuals.

Keywords:

• Vitamin C
• oxidative stress
• albuminuria
• eGFR
• chronic kidney disease

Acknowledgments

We thank the NHANES staff for their efforts in creating this database, and also thank the assistance of the Boston Professional Group editorial team for language polishing.

Authors contributions

Jing Li: conception and design of the study, and the review of the manuscript; Chunli Wang: conception and design of the study, data analysis and manuscript writing; Jili Zhao and Qiaoqiao Zhou: data collection. All authors contributed to the article and approved the final manuscript.

Ethics statement

The NHANES protocols were approved by the National Center for Health Statistics ethics review board, and written informed consent was obtained from all study participants.

Disclosure statement

The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.

Data availability statement

Publicly available datasets were analyzed in this study. These data can be found here: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nhanes/.

Additional information

Funding

This study was not supported by any funding.