Assessment of nutritional anaemia in Northern Nigeria

In order to assess a number of serum parameters of nutritional anemia in Northern Nigeria a study was undertaken of 32 farmers (non-elite Nigerians) 10 hospital personnel (elite Nigerians) 18 homozygous sickle-cell children and 15 patients with hookworm anemia; 8 Europeans were used as controls. Variables studied were iron transferrin concentration and saturation ferritin B-12 and folic acid. Results are listed in Table 1. Serum ferritin concentration appears to reflect body iron stores but the levels obtained were higher than anticipated. Despite this mean ferritin in non-elite and hookworm patients was still significantly lower than controls. Serum iron and transferrin saturation appears to reflect the clinical situation. Both parameters were significantly reduced in non-elite hookworm and sickle-cell patients in relation controls (Figure 1). Mean serum B-12 was comparable to controls for all patient groups but folate deficiency was present in the non-elite and hookworm patients (Figure 2). In this study a combination of serum ferritin concentration and transferrin saturation was the best method of assessing status. In addition results from this study indicate the need for establishing a normal range for each parameter for the particular population.