Prevalence of Anaemia in Hypothyroid Patients in a Tertiary Care Hospital

Abstract

BACKGROUND Anaemia is one of the most common conditions observed in the clinical practice. Various causative factors have been associated with anaemia. Association of hypothyroidism with anaemia has been studied and it was recognized that prevalence of anaemia is higher in hypothyroid patients compared to normal population. We wanted to identify the prevalence of anaemia in overt hypothyroid patients in our geographical region. METHODS This is a cross sectional study conducted at SVS Medical College, Mahbubnagar. All the clinically evident and laboratory confirmed hypothyroid cases during the study period of September 2018 to august 2019 were included. A total of 92 hypothyroid patients were included and were evaluated further for anaemia. Prevalence of anaemia and type of anaemia was studied, and appropriate statistical analysis was used. RESULTS Out of 92 hypothyroid patients evaluated, anaemia was found in 34 (36.95%). and females were predominantly affected when compared to males. Most common type of anaemia observed was normochromic and normocytic anaemia. (55.88%) anaemic cases were normocytic followed by microcytic (38.2%); whereas, very few cases were macrocytic (5.8%). The mean age of 39.2 was observed in females whereas in males the mean age was 41.3. None of the males have shown severe anaemia whereas majority of the females were having severe anaemia. CONCLUSIONS Hypothyroidism and anaemia are fairly common conditions observed in the clinical practice and also hypothyroidism is one of the factors for causation of anaemia. It is therefore mandatory to do a proper evaluation of thyroid patients.