Vitamin D research has experienced a true hype in all fields of medicine in the last decades. In critical illness, this increased interest has only started 10 years ago.

The high prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in critically ill patients and the rationale for a modulating role of vitamin D in acute illness but also long-term outcomes is certainly intriguing.

However, vitamin D is no panacea, so it is not surprising that even large studies like the recent VITAL trial were unable to demonstrate an effect of vitamin D in a relatively healthy and largely vitamin D replete population.

In this short review, we will focus on the role of vitamin D in a well-defined setting of critically ill patients: patients undergoing cardiac surgery and organ transplantation. We will highlight the rationale for the potential benefit of vitamin D supplementation and briefly discuss the ongoing large intervention trials in the ICU setting.

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