Low plasma levels of vitamin A and E during weight reduction.

Current knowledge and the growing awareness of adverse consequences of human obesity to health has resulted in a frequent use of different weight reducing regimes within the last years. Much attention has been paid in the past to the effect of weight reduction on atherosclerotic risk factors and numerous reports have been published regarding protein and carbohydrate metabolism in obese subjects. Very few studies have evaluated the vitamin status of patients undergoing rapid and/or longterm weight reduction, particularly in grossly obese children and adolescents (1, 2).