Asthma is a common chronic respiratory disease that affects millions of people worldwide, and its prevalence continues to increase. Vitamin D has been proposed as a potential environmental factor in asthma pathogenesis, due to its immunomodulatory effects. This systematic review aimed to evaluate the effect of vitamin D supplementation in order to prevent airway remodeling in asthmatic patients. Four electronic databases, namely PubMed, Embase, Clinical trails.gov, and CINAHL, were thoroughly searched to conduct a comprehensive literature review. The International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews (CRD42023413798) contains a record of the registered protocol. We identified 9447 studies during the initial search; 9 studies (0.1%) met the inclusion criteria and were included in the systematic review. All included studies were experimental studies that investigated the impact of vitamin D supplementation on airway remodeling in asthma. The studies included in this review suggest that vitamin D inhibits airway smooth muscle cell contraction and remodeling, reduces inflammation, regulates collagen synthesis in the airways, and modulates the action of bronchial fibroblasts. However, one study suggests that TGF-β1 can impair vitamin D-induced and constitutive airway epithelial host defense mechanisms. Overall, vitamin D appears to have a potential role in the prevention and management of asthma.
Keywords: airway remodeling; asthma; inflammation; smooth muscle cell; vitamin D.