Background: The most common causes of death in patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD) are cardiovascular diseases and infections, and both have been linked to impaired vitamin D levels and dysregulated immune response. The aim of this work is to study the relation between vitamin D levels in children with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) on regular hemodialysis (HD) and their immune status.
Patients and Methods: This case–control study was conducted at the Nephrology Unit, Department of Pediatrics, the Zagazig University Hospital, from April 2010 to August 2010. We studied 27 children with ESRD on regular HD (group-A) whose mean age was 8 ± 1.3 years; there were 15 males and 12 females. The study patients were divided into two groups depending on the degree of vitamin D deficiency; group-A1 had 12 patients, all of whom had vitamin D deficiency defined as serum concentration of 25-hydroxy vitamin D3 [25(OH) D3] of 15–30 ng/mL. Group-A2 had 15 patients with more severe vitamin D deficiency (