Effect of Vitamin D3 Supplementation on Chronic Granulomatous Disease Patients With BCGosis/Itis

Chronic granulomatous disease (CGD) is one of primary immunodeficiency diseases. Due to the deficiency of the phagocyte nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) oxidase the respiratory burst of all types of phagocytic cells is badly impaired which lead to a susceptibility to infection among CGD patients.

BCG vaccine is wildly used in China to avoid severe tuberculosis infection. Children are supposed to get BCG vaccine injected within 24 hours after birth. When patients with CGD got the vaccination of BCG they will easily got infected. And due to the immunodeficiency of these children, the infection cannot be cure by normal treatment.

Vitamin D supplementation was used to treat tuberculosis in the pre-antibiotic era and is reported to have influence on immune system especially on monocytes and macrophages thus may help CGD children defend the BCG infection. In addition, studies show that 1,25-Dihydroxyvitamin D3 can induce nitric oxide synthase thus may up regulate NO production and help host defense against human tuberculosis without the help of NADPH oxidase. Other researches indicate that Vitamin D and the expression of vitamin D receptor may lead to induction of antimicrobial peptide such as LL-37 which help macrophages kill the intracellular Mycobacterium tuberculosis. These discoveries indicated that vitamin D may induce immune response against BCG in a nontraditional way. Therefore, when CGD patients face BCG infection, add vitamin D supplementation to the treatment may help them survive this challenge.

Since there have had clinical trials revealing that intermittent high dose vitamin D3 supplementation as 2.5mg per 14 days only receive positive effect on partial patients the investigators decide to choose a mild dose treatment as 800IU/d for 3 month to see if things get different in this way.