A computational model for prediction of ferritin and haemoglobin levels in blood donors

Abstract

Many donors are deferred because of low haemoglobin (Hb) levels, especially young (pre-menopausal) women. 1,2 Donating frequently may exhaust iron stores and lead to iron deficiency anaemia. 3 To prevent iron deficiency in blood donors, many blood donation centres have started monitoring ferritin levels in donors. [4][5][6][7][8][9][10] Blood centres use different strategies in managing donors with low ferritin levels. 5,6,11 In some countries donors are given oral iron supplementation, 5,9,12 while in others donors are deferred. 6,10 Nevertheless, donors are still at risk of becoming iron deficient. It would be beneficial for both donor health and blood service efficiency if an optimal donation frequency could be predicted to prevent blood donation-associated iron deficiency.Erythropoiesis and iron status are tightly linked, and inclusion of these processes is a prerequisite for reliable prediction of Hb and ferritin levels in relation to blood donation. Both erythropoiesis and regulation of iron homeostasis are complex processes themselves, and perhaps for this reason, have to date mostly been modelled in isolation. For example, an iron homeostasis model investigating control of liver iron by hepcidin can adequately reproduce findings in haemochromatosis, but considers iron in red blood cells to be

An international comparison of haemoglobin deferral prediction models for blood banking

“…To account for sudden drops in Hb level, inclusion of the previous Hb seems to be more relevant. The importance of first Hb levels is also shown by others [17], which indicates that iron dynamics F I G U R E 3 Adjusted area under the precision-recall as a function of the deferral rate for various deferral levels in the Belgian dataset. The reduction in deferral rate was obtained by sequentially removing an increasing number of deferred donations from the data.…”

“…To account for sudden drops in Hb level, inclusion of the previous Hb seems to be more relevant. The importance of first Hb levels is also shown by others [17], which indicates that iron dynamics (Hb and ferritin levels) in blood donors can be predicted over a longer period from the Hb and ferritin levels at donor intake.…”

Validity of donor‐reported iron supplementation practices obtained at the time of donation

“…Despite the importance of exogenous iron in maintaining iron stores and fitness for donation for frequent blood donors, 7,8,13 blood centers have little insight into the use of iron by their blood donors. As blood centers begin to consider innovations such as personalized inter-donation intervals, [14][15][16] the success of such endeavors will be considerably enhanced by the ability to collect and leverage accurate information on iron intake. This is the first report to our knowledge to measure the potential reliability of donor-reported IS behaviors provided at the blood donation site.…”