The Association Between Blood Lead Level and Microcytic Hypochoromic Anemia in Children

Abstract

Background: Iron deficiency, as the most common nutritional deficiency, often occurs in the pediatric age group due to rapid growth and low dietary iron content. Objectives: The present study aimed to assess the relationship between microcytic hypochromic anemia and blood lead level below the standard acceptable upper range in children aged between one and ten years. Methods: In this study, 27 cases, who fulfilled the inclusion criteria were assigned to group A, as hypochromic microcytic anemia with iron deficiency. Another 18 hypochromic microcytic anemia cases with normal ferritin levels were assigned to group B. Besides, 20 healthy children were chosen as the control group. All the statistical analyses were performed using the SPSS statistical software. P values of Results: The children in group A showed significant correlations between lead levels and hemoglobin (-0.770; P values = 0.001), mean corpuscular volume (MCV) (-0.679; P values = 0.001), and ferritin (-0.509; P values Conclusions: Our study results imply that there is no secure threshold for blood lead level at which, lead begins to cause interruption with hematologic parameters in young children.

Keywords

• lead
• iron deficiency
• microcytic hypochromic anemia
• pediatric