Define Factors that Lead to Vitamin K Deficiency?

The factors that lead to vitamin K deficiency include:

1) Marginal dietary intake if one undergoes trauma and extensive surgery etc.

2) Inadequate intake of vitamin K by the mother leads to haemorrhagic disease in the newborn, with low prothrombin level.

3) Inadequate intestinal absorption (disease of liver and intestine such as biliary obstruction, malabsorption and parenchymal liver disease) leads to deficiency in adults. Large amounts of vitamin A and E may interfere with the absorption or metabolism of vitamin k. In severe disease of the liver, the synthesis of the clotting factors is impaired even though the source of vitamin K is adequate.

The population groups that appear most at risk for vitamin K deficiency are newborn infants and people who have been injured and have renal insufficiency.

 In infants up to around age 6 months, vitamin K deficiency, although rare, represents a significant public health problem throughout the world. The deficiency syndrome is traditionally known as haemorrhagic disease of' the newborn. More recently, in  order to give a better definition of the cause, it has been termed vitamin K deficiency, bleeding ( VKDB ).  Epidemiological studies worldwide have identified two major risk factors for VKDB viz; exclusive human-milk feeding and the failure to give any vitamin K prophylaxis.  The increased risk for infants fed human milk compared with formula milk is probably related to the relatively low concentrations of vitamin K (phylloquinone) in breast milk compared with formula milks.