Serum vitamin levels and major depressive disorder: Age-dependent associations in the US adult population

This study used National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data to explore the potential association of serum vitamins with major depressive disorder (MDD) among US adults, as well as the potential moderating role of age. This study screened eligible individuals aged ≥ 20 years from NHANES 2005 to 2006 and 2017 to 2018 cycle in the US. Multivariate-adjusted logistic regression models were used to explore the relationship between 5 serum vitamins and MDD. We built 3 models to adjust the potential confounders of 13 factors (age, gender, ethnicity, FIPR, education, hypertension, high cholesterol, diabetes, body mass index, sleep time, dietary quality, physical activity and alcohol consumption) on the outcome. Interaction analysis was performed to explore the moderating effects of age on such association. A total of 4278 participants were included, including 3133 (73.23%) individuals aged < 60 years and 1145 (26.76%) individuals ≥ 60 years. In Age < 60 years group, 229 (7.3%) participants had depressive symptoms. We only observed a negative association between vitamin D (VD) and depressive symptoms (OR = 0.986; 95% CI = 0.973-0.998). Among participants ≥ 60 years old, about 82 (7.71%) of the participation had depressive symptoms. Negative associations with the risk of MDD were found for vitamin A (VA) (OR = 0.212, 95% CI = 0.087-0.512) and VD (OR = 0.853, 95% CI = 0.798-0.912). In addition, we found there were significant interactions between both VA, vitamin E and age on depressive symptom (P = .027, P = .006, respectively). This study investigated the association between serum vitamins and major depression through analysis. The result showed that VD was negatively associated with severe depression in younger patients, while VA and vitamin E were negatively associated with severe depression in older patients. This study provides a new perspective for individualized treatment and intervention of age stratification in severe depression.