Iron Stores in Low and Normal Birth Weight Infants at Birth and in Early Infancy

Abstract

Serum ferritin levels of low birth weight (LBW; BW < 2,500 g) and normal birth weight (NBW; BW ≥ 2,500 g) infants were evaluated at birth and at 3 mo using electrochemiluminescence immunoassay. At birth, levels were 318.6 (31.0-829.5) ng/mL in LBW (n = 217) and 366.2 (122.4-858.5) ng/mL in NBW infants (n = 116; p < 0.01), with 1.4 % of LBW and none of the NBW infants having levels <12 ng/mL (p = 0.20). At follow up, levels were 66.9 (4.5-567.7) ng/mL in LBW (n = 126) and 126.2 (6.8-553.7) ng/mL in NBW infants (n = 76; p = 0.27), with 11.9 % of LBW and 11.8 % of NBW infants having levels <12 ng/mL (p = 0.80).

Ferritin concentrations in low-birth babies in South-west Nigeria

“…The wide reference range (20 -250µg/dl) of ferritin concentrations could account for this non-significant difference. This finding is in agreement with many previous reports 3,22 .…”

Iron Deficiency Anemia

“…The findings are in agreement with previous studies. 17,18 A recent study 19 reported similar age findings in male population. Of 100 study subjects, 53% were male and 47% were female, this is in accordance to recent study.…”

“…8 One of the earliest blood manifestations of IDA is the rise in the RDW value, 9 and it is highly cost effective tool to exploit it for the early diagnosis of IDA. [9][10][11] RDW is generated by auto-hematology analyzer as part of routine complete blood count. 12 The present prospective study evaluated the discriminative and predictive value of RDW as a alternative test for detecting iron deficiency anemia among children.…”