Haemoglobin Levels in Cardiff Children of Nursery School Age

Evans, Daniel M.; Lewis, John R.; Curran, Enid

doi:10.1136/adc.47.255.772

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 3 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…This concept is supported by the observations that infants given 250 mg iron dextran intramuscularly at the age of 9 months still show a low average MCV of 78-9 and 82-3 fl when they reach the ages of 12 and 18 months respectively, despite the parenteral iron therapy (Sturgeon, 1958), and that although children with haemoglobin levels above 12-4 g/dl have a low mean MCV (our data) such children do not increase their haemoglobin levels after six weeks of oral iron therapy (Evans et al, 1972).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 43%

Red cell indices and serum ferritin levels in children.

Hows¹,

Hussein²,

Av³

et al. 1977

J Clin Pathol

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

SUMMARY The blood counts of 187 non-anaemic children who attended hospital with minor illnesses and who were between the ages of 12 months and 6 years were studied retrospectively. As many as 76-8 % of these children were found to have MCVs below the normal adult range. A prospective study of a further 28 non-anaemic children in the same age group showed that the majority of children with low MCVs have normal haemoglobin A2 and F levels and have serum ferritin levels within the normal adult range. These findings indicate that microcytosis is an intrinsic feature of erythropoiesis in early childhood and that in most instances this feature cannot be attributed to iron deficiency or f-thalassaemia syndromes.Previous authors have shown that many children whose haemoglobin concentrations are within the usually accepted normal range (above 10-8 g/dl (World Health Organisation, 1959)) have a low mean corpuscular volume (MCV) and a low mean corpuscular haemoglobin (MCH) compared with normal adults (Guest and Brown, 1957;Sturgeon, 1958;Schmaier et al., 1974) and have attributed these findings to a high prevalence of iron deficiency in children. The present study was undertaken to investigate the validity of this explanation. Our results clearly indicate that iron deficiency accounts for only a minor proportion of the microcytosis of childhood and that normal iron-replete children show microcytosis, their red cells being smaller the lower the age of the child. Material and methods SUBJECTS STUDIEDIn a preliminary study, a retrospective analysis of the data from blood samples of 200 randomly selected children between the ages of 12 months and 6 years were made. Most of these children were suffering from trivial medical complaints or were having a routine blood count before planned minor surgery. Nineteen of the 200 children were excluded from the study because they had chronic diseases which might affect erythropoiesis or showed anaemia (ie, Hb < Received for publication 8 June 1976 10-8 g/dl) or were already known to have a haemoglobinopathy. As the children included in the retrospective study were drawn from a multiracial population, it is possible that undiagnosed thalassaemia syndromes, haemoglobinopathies or iron deficiency could have accounted for the high incidence of low MCVs and MCHs subsequently observed. These possibilities were investigated in a prospective study on a further 28 consecutive non-anaemic children aged between 22 months and 6 years attending an outpatient department. On these 28 children we performed blood counts, Sickledex tests, and haemoglobin electrophoresis and estimated haemoglobin A2 and F levels. Serum ferritin levels were assayed in 20 of the 28 children. METHODSBlood counts were performed on a Coulter Counter, Model S, standardised with 4C Coulter Counter cell control. Serum ferritin levels were assayed using the technique of Addison et al. (1972). In our hands, the mean serum ferritin level in 38 non-anaemic, normal adult females was 56-6 ,ug/l (range 14-148 ug/l) and in 39 non-anaem...

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 43%

Red cell indices and serum ferritin levels in children.

Hows¹,

Hussein²,

Av³

et al. 1977

J Clin Pathol

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

Anemia in urban underprivileged children. Iron, folate, and vitamin B12 nutrition

Margo¹,

Baroni²,

Green³

et al. 1977

The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The prevalence and type of nutritional anemia was investigated in 344 children aged 1 to 16 years of mixed race and living in a poor urban setting. Iron deficiency anemia was common in 1-year-old children (23%) as was biochemical evidence of iron deficiency (53%). Anemia rates were minimal in older children and the prevalence of iron deficiency decreased with age. Folate deficiency did not appear to contribute to the etiology of anemia, and nutritional vitamin B12 deficiency was not present. No-relationship could be found between a number of familial variables and hematological nutritional status. It is suggested that to identify families whose children are at risk for nutritional anemia new approaches will be needed to define their characteristics.

show abstract