Conditions: Crohn's Disease Vitamin D Deficiency
Keywords: Crohn's disease Vitamin D deficiency
Allocation: RANDOMIZED | Intervention model: SINGLE_GROUP
Enrollment: 11
Healthy volunteers: no

Brief summary:
Crohn's disease is more common in areas of the world with less sunlight exposure. Sunlight is a major source of vitamin D. There is some research to suggest that patient's with higher vitamin D levels are less likely to undergo surgeries and have better control of their disease. We intend to study the effects of high dose vitamin D supplementation in patients with vitamin D deficiency and Crohn's disease. We hypothesize that patients given high doses will have less hospitalizations, surgeries, steroid use.

Detailed description:
Subjects are randomized to low or high dose vitamin D, and outcomes including steroid prescriptions, CD-related hospitalizations, CD-related surgeries, and the modified Harvey-Bradshaw Index are measured.

Arms:
arm 1: Patients will be given 400 IU cholecalciferol once daily for 30 days. \<-THIS IS THE Active Comparator Intervention. To maintain the blind, a random few will be given another round at the 30 day mark. For patients who enroll in the summer, a random few will again receive 400 IU cholecalciferol in March. arm 2: Patients will be given cholecalciferol 10,000 IU daily for 30 days. \<-THIS IS THE INTERVENTION. At that point, if their vitamin D levels remain below 50 ng/ml, the 30 day course will be repeated. For patients who enroll in the summer, levels will be rechecked in March and if \<50 ng/ml, a 30 day course will be administered.

Interventions: intervention 1: Cholecalciferol 10,000 IU intervention 2: Cholecalciferol 400 IU
Intervention descriptions: intervention 1: Cholecalciferol 10,000 IU po daily intervention 2: Cholecalciferol 400 IU po daily

Protocol document: