Iron-deficiency anemia and associated factors among preschool children in Diamantina, Minas Gerais, Brazil

Abstract

Objective: Study the prevalence of iron depletion and iron-deficiency anemia and their associated factors in preschool children. Methods: Cross-sectional study with five-year old preschool children from a birth cohort of the city of Diamantina, Minas Gerais state, Brazil. Socioeconomic, demographic, and dietary characteristics were obtained through a questionnaire administered to each child mother or guardian. Iron depletion (normal hemoglobin and low serum ferritin levels) and iron-deficiency anemia (hemoglobin level than 11g/dL) were detected after collecting 5mL of venous blood of preschool children. Poisson regression was used to identify the factors associated with iron depletion and iron-deficiency anemia. Results: A total of 228 preschool were evaluated, corresponding to 97.4% of the children from a cohort study followed-up up to the end of their first year of life. Iron depletion and iron-deficiency anemia were detected, respectively, in 15.9% and 18.9% of the preschool children evaluated. Iron depletion was not associated with any variable studied, while low maternal education level was associated with iron-deficiency anemia (PR=1.83; P=0.03). Conclusion: Iron-deficiency anemia is considered as a mild public health problem among 5-year old children in the city of Diamantina, Minas Gerais. Higher maternal education level was a protective factor against this deficiency, and therefore it is as an important marker for the occurrence of iron-deficiency anemia in the population studied.

Dietary Determinants of Anemia in Children Aged 6–36 Months: A Cross-Sectional Study in Indonesia

“…As mentioned in the Brazilian study [ 21 ], inadequate intake of lipids and protein was also associated with anemia. Considering oil intake as an intake of lipid, a community-based cross-sectional study done in South-West Ethiopia found that iron deficiency anemia was significantly lower among subjects consuming oils [ 22 ].…”

“…This shows the importance of an appropriate dietary intake in the prevention of anemia. However, a study among preschooler children in Brazil found that there was no significant difference between dietary intake of iron, energy, and protein between those children with or without iron depletion or iron deficiency anemia status [ 21 ]. This finding suggests that besides paying attention to adequate intake of dietary iron, other factors such as socio-economic of the household and childcare are also important as confounding variables [ 22 ].…”

Iron deficiency anemia among children aged 2–5 years in southern Ethiopia: a community-based cross-sectional study

“…Nevertheless, the lack of association with IDA must be interpreted with care as only 107 cases were involved, and the study may not have been sufficiently powered to detect all risk factors statistically. However, studies from Rwanda and Brazil have also show that socio-demographic characteristics of the household were not associated with iron deficiency anemia ( Nobre et al, 2017 ; Rutayisire, Nwaike & Marete, 2019 ). In this study, mothers with better education ate more iron-rich foods, as it is supported by other studies in Ethiopia ( Tiruneh et al, 2020 ; Choi et al, 2011 ).…”

Ciências da Saúde 4

“…Of the total of 85 articles found, 6were selected. The prevalence of iron deficiency anemia was 55.1%, 55.6%,16.1%, 58.1%, 21.5%, 18.9%, in the studies ofNeves et al (2005),Vieira et al (2007), Camillo et al (2008, Carvalho et al(2010),Castro et al (2011),Nobre et al (2017), respectively.…”