How common is Vitamin B12 deficiency - A report on deficiency among healthy adults from a medical college in rural area of North-West India

Abstract

Introduction:Vitamin B12 is an essential micronutrient that plays a fundamental role in cell division and in one carbon metabolism. Materials and Methods: This was an observational study carried out at among students and staff of a medical college facility located in a rural area of north-west India. Results: Mean serum vitamin B12 in both the groups of employees as well as students, was low (group I N 69: 241.56 ± 101.88 pg/ml; group II N 84: 217.98 ± 92.78 pg/ml). Using 200 pg/ml as threshold, 53.6% of total participants had low vitamin B12 concentration (66.6% of female students and 70.6% of female employees), while 16.3% of study population was severely deficient having serum vitamin B12 level below150 pg/ml. Conclusion: Our observation of high prevalence of sub-optimal vitamin B12 is consistent with findings drawn from scholarly literature and supplemented with those from our country too.