I used to think that the most common health problem among women in Kabul was iron deficiency and the anemia caused by it, but my clinical experience over the past year has changed that perception.
Kabul 24: Because almost every female patient for whom I ordered a vitamin D level test has clearly shown vitamin D deficiency, and the repetition of this pattern strengthens the likelihood that, in the population of female patients I see, vitamin D deficiency is even more prevalent than iron-deficiency anemia.
However, these findings — due to selection bias and the sample being limited to women who seek medical care — cannot be directly generalised to all women in the city of Kabul or to the entire female population of Afghanistan.
Nevertheless, the recurring pattern of vitamin D deficiency could serve as the starting point for a systematic epidemiological study with the hypothesis:
“The prevalence of vitamin D deficiency among women living in Kabul is higher than the prevalence of iron deficiency and iron-deficiency anemia.”
Jamshid Mehrpour – Kabul
