A cross-sectional study on evaluation of anemia in elderly in a tertiary care hospital

Abstract

Background: Age-related anaemia in the elderly should not be considered as a given. Anaemia is now understood to put older persons at risk for a variety of negative outcomes, such as hospitalisation, morbidity, and mortality1 . In light of the fact that the older demographic is an important one and is expanding quickly, anaemia is becoming more common as people age2 . Anaemia is defined by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as haemoglobin below 12 g/dL in women and below 13 g/dL in men3 . Objectives 1. To study the clinical profile of patients with anemia in elderly. 2. To study hematological pattern of anemia in elderly. 3. To know the etiology of anemia in elderly. Material & Methods Study Design: A prospective hospital based cross-sectional study. Study area: Department of General Medicine, Government Medical College, Kadapa, Andhra Pradesh. Study Period: 1 year. Study population: Inpatients and outpatients aged ≥65 years attending to medical outpatient department (OPD) or admitted in medical wards of Government General Hospital, Kadapa. Sample size: Two Hundred ten patients above the age of 65 years were included in the study. Sampling method: Simple random technique. Results: Peripheral smear studies in the study population include % of microcytic hypochromic 98 cases (46.66%) of cases Normocytic normochromic 81 cases (40.95%) Macrocytic hypochromic 26 cases (12.38%). Serum ferritin levels were estimated in all patients having a microcytic blood picture. Total of 11 out of 30 patients had serum ferritin values <20 ng/ml (absolute iron deficiency), 3 patients had no evidence of iron deficiency having ferritin values >100 ng/ml and 16 patients had varying degree of iron deficiency (with ferritin values between 20 and 100 ng/ml). Conclusion: Thus evaluation of anemia by both history, clinical examination, laboratory studies help us to identify the cause, and unnecessary usage of iron supplements and NSAIDS can be reduced.