Vitamin A deficiency symptom?

• A. Night blindness
• B. Peripheral neuropathy
• C. Macrocytic anemia
• D. Bleeding gums

Answer: (A)

Night blindness is the symptom you’ll see with vitamin A deficiency because vitamin A is needed to make the light-detecting pigment in rod cells of the retina. The pigment, rhodopsin, relies on a vitamin A–derived component (11-cis-retinal) to reset after light exposure. When vitamin A is lacking, rods can’t regenerate rhodopsin efficiently, so adapting from bright to dim light becomes difficult. That early impairment in low-light vision—nyctalopia or night blindness—often appears before other ocular signs like dryness or corneal changes.

As deficiency progresses, dryness of the conjunctiva and cornea (xerophthalmia) and keratinization of epithelia can develop, but the initial and most characteristic symptom is night blindness.

Why the other options don’t fit as typical vitamin A deficiency symptoms: peripheral neuropathy points to other nutritional issues or diseases (not a hallmark of vitamin A deficiency). Macrocytic anemia is classically linked to folate or vitamin B12 deficiencies. Bleeding gums are more typical of vitamin C deficiency (scurvy) or other causes of periodontal disease, not vitamin A deficiency.