Study of Prevalence and Risk Factors of Hypovitaminosis C in Long Term Care Unit

NCT ID: NCT03807791

Last Updated: 2025-09-03

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: COMPLETED
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 100 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2019-01-31
• Study Completion Date: 2019-06-14

Brief Summary

The clinical finding of skin rashes which appear after a vitamin C deficiency in Long Term Care Unit leads us to believe that the institutional diet could predispose to this kind of deficiency. Vitamin C has a key role into the struggle against oxidant stress and is involved into the connective tissue formation of the skin and the vascular endothelium. Vitamin C deficiency affects currently 15 to 25% of the elderly over 65 years old reaching 15% women and 20% men after 65 according to Johnston and Al. It concerns mainly the people in precarious situations (persons without fixed homes, ethyl-smoking persons) and elderly over 65 years. Hypovitaminosis C, defined by plasma level between 5 mg/L and 15 mg/L (28.41 to 85.23 µmol/L), is currently undiagnosed, especially with people with a risk of food deficiency and its prevalence increases with age. The treatment consists of a daily oral supplementation of 1 gram of vitamin C/d for 15 days. A minimum intake of 10 mg/D of vitamin C is required to prevent scurvy and maintain a total pool of 350 mg. A diet modification by a systematic intake of 2 glasses of fresh orange juice and/or the consumption of raw fruits and vegetables would prevent the appearance of scurvy.

Conditions

Vitamin C Deficiency; Scurvy

Study Design

• Allocation Method: NA
• Intervention Model: SINGLE_GROUP
• Primary Study Purpose: PREVENTION
• Blinding Strategy: NONE

Study Groups

Patient living in the Unit of Long Term Care

Patient living in the Unit of Long Term Care without any limit time

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Blood sample

Intervention Type: PROCEDURE

A blood sample will be taken by the nurse of our unit within a week after their consent. It consists as a simple blood sample and it will be taken during the normal analysis planed by the chief of the service in order to avoid to collect two different samples.

The measurement method will use equipment from the Lyon Sud hospital laboratory. The samples need a pre-treatment in the 3 hours after taking the blood to avoid the oxidation of vitamin C and a result lower than expected.

Interventions

Blood sample

A blood sample will be taken by the nurse of our unit within a week after their consent. It consists as a simple blood sample and it will be taken during the normal analysis planed by the chief of the service in order to avoid to collect two different samples.

The measurement method will use equipment from the Lyon Sud hospital laboratory. The samples need a pre-treatment in the 3 hours after taking the blood to avoid the oxidation of vitamin C and a result lower than expected.

Intervention Type: PROCEDURE

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Male or female over 65 years old
• living in the Unit of Long Term Care without any limit time.
• with a system of social insurance
• Who gave its consent by his own , or with help of his representant or his tutor or curator.

Exclusion Criteria

• rejection of the blood sample
• patient feeding with articial nutritional feeding (stomach tube feeding)
• person close to death, who is not able to feed himself and / or with life-threatening in short time.
• Patient with personal history of vitamin C deficiency.

• Minimum Eligible Age: 65 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

Hospices Civils de Lyon

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Responsibility Role: SPONSOR

Locations

Unité de soins Longue Durée, Hôpital Pierre Garraud (Hospices Civils de Lyon)

Lyon, , France

Countries

France

References

Lagorsse C., Oumédian E., Bourguignon L, de La Gastine B. Les carences en vitamine C, une cause peu connue d'affections cutanées en institution gériatrique : à propos de 2 cas en Unité de Soins de Longue Durée (USLD). Rev Geriatr 2019 Février 44 2.

Reference Type: BACKGROUND

Other Identifiers

69HCL18_0392

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id