American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol 47, 247-252, Copyright © 1988 by The American Society for Clinical Nutrition, Inc

ORIGINAL RESEARCH COMMUNICATIONS

Ethnic and racial differences in serum vitamin A levels of children aged 4-11 years

AC Looker, CL Johnson, CE Woteki, EA Yetley and BA Underwood
Division of Health Examination Statistics, National Center for Health Statistics, Hyattsville, MD 20782.

Interpretation of differences in serum vitamin A levels observed between Hispanic and non-Hispanic children may be complicated by confounding environmental factors. Data from the Mexican-American portion of the Hispanic Health and Nutrition Examination Survey and the second National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey were used to explore these differences in 4-11-y-old Mexican Americans and non- Hispanic blacks and whites before and after accounting for vitamin- mineral supplement use and poverty status. Initial differences in mean serum vitamin A levels and prevalences less than 20 micrograms/dL (0.70 mumol/L) or less than 25 micrograms/dL (0.87 mumol/L) among the three ethnic or racial groups were reduced or eliminated after accounting for the two descriptive variables. These results support the hypothesis that differences in serum vitamin A levels between Mexican-American and non-Hispanic children in the United States are due more to environmental factors than to ethnicity.

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