Guidance
The evidence
Introduction
The evidence statements from 1 review are provided by external contractors (see Supporting evidence).
This section lists how the evidence statements and expert papers link to the recommendations and sets out a brief summary of findings from the economic analysis.
How the evidence links to the recommendations
The evidence statements are short summaries of evidence, in a review, report or paper (provided by an expert in the topic area). Each statement has a short code indicating which document the evidence has come from.
Evidence statement number 1.1 indicates that the linked statement is numbered 1 in review 1.
EM indicates that the economic modelling report is linked to a recommendation.
Where a recommendation is not directly taken from the evidence statements, but is inferred from the evidence, this is indicated by IDE (inference derived from the evidence).
Recommendation 1: evidence statements 1.11, 1.14, 1.15, 1.16
Recommendation 2: evidence statements 1.10, 2.12; IDE
Recommendation 3: evidence statements 1.1, 1.10, 1.11; 2.12; IDE
Recommendation 4: evidence statements 1.1, 1.3, 1.10, 1.11, 1.14, 1.15, 2.10, 2.13
Recommendation 5: evidence statements 1.1, 1.3, 1.5, 1.7, 1.9, 1.11, 1.14, 1.15, 1.16, 2.10; EM
Recommendation 6: evidence statements 1.1, 1.3, 1.5, 1.7, 1.8, 1.9, 1.11, 1.12, 1.13, 1.14, 1.15, 1.16, 2.2; EM
Recommendation 7: evidence statements 1.7; EM; IDE
Recommendation 8: evidence statements 1.10, 1.11, 2.2, 2.9
Recommendation 9: evidence statements 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 1.5, 1.6, 1.10, 1.11, 2.3, 2.4, 2.5, 2.13
Recommendation 10: evidence statements 1.10, 1.11, 1.12, 2.14
Recommendation 11: evidence statement 2.6; IDE
Economic modelling
The economic model addressed the question: 'What is the most cost-effective way of providing vitamin D to specific population groups (pregnant women, children under 5 years, people aged 65 or over and people whose skin is darker)?' There were not enough data to model this question for 'people whose skin is not sufficiently exposed to the sun'.
There were 2 sets of analysis. The first compared the cost of providing each group with a daily supplement (without testing for deficiency) with the cost of testing everyone and giving those with a deficiency a supplement.
The second analysis looked at increasing uptake of supplements among pregnant and breastfeeding women, and among children up to the age of 5.
See An economic evaluation of interventions to improve the uptake of vitamin D supplements in England.