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Abstract This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of intramuscular iron-dextran injection to suckling pigs at either a high level or with two doses on preweaning growth performance and hematological variables. At d 1 of age, a total of 36 pigs (body weight = 1.56 ± 0.13 kg) from 6 sow litters with litter size greater than 10 pigs were selected, and six piglets per litter were assigned to 3 treatments based on body weight and sex. Treatments were: 1) NC: 200 mg intramuscular iron injection at d 1 of age, 2) PC: 400 mg intramuscular iron injection at d 1 of age, 3) NC+IRON: 200 mg intramuscular iron injection at d 1 of age and 200 mg iron injection at d 7 of age. The body weight, hemoglobin, and hematocrit concentrations were measured at d 1 (before initial iron injection for all treatments), 3, 7 (second dose for the NC+IRON treatment), 9, 12, and 19 (weaning) of age. A repeated measures ANOVA was used to analyze body weight, hemoglobin, and hematocrit results. There were no significant differences in body weight, hemoglobin, and hematocrit concentrations among iron injection treatments (P 0.89) and no interactions between iron injection treatment and day of age (P 0.64) from d 1 to 19 of age, although hemoglobin and hematocrit concentrations were numerically greater in the PC and NC+IRON treatments at d 19 of age (129.2, 133.4, and 133.82 g/dL hemoglobin for the NC, PC, and NC+IRON treatments, respectively). Hemoglobin and hematocrit concentrations declined (P 0.01) from d 1 to 3 of age regardless of iron injection and then increased until weaning (d 19 of age; 86.9, 78.1, 87.6, 94.0, 105.7, and 132.1 g/dL hemoglobin for d 1, 3, 7, 9, 12, and 19 of age, respectively), where the hemoglobin concentrations were similar between d 1 and 7 of age (P 0.76) whereas the hematocrit concentrations were greater at d 7 of age compared with d 1 of age (P 0.05; 31.8% vs. 29.1%). Hemoglobin concentrations were significantly correlated with hematocrit concentrations (P 0.01), and the correlation coefficients were greatest at d 1 and 3 of age and weaning (d 19 of age; r 0.92). In conclusion, increased hemoglobin and hematocrit concentrations were observed in all treatments, resulting in no significant difference in the preweaning growth performance of piglets. Although the iron injection was performed at d 1 of age, hemoglobin and hematocrit concentrations decreased in the first few days of life and then increased. Hemoglobin and hematocrit values are positively correlated from birth to weaning.
Safaie et al. (Wed,) studied this question.