MATERIALS AND METHODS: A retrospective study was carried out on 318 subjects with hypochromic anaemia, which comprised 162 IDA and 156 thalassaemia trait subjects with α-thalassemia, β-thalassemia and HbE trait. Optimal cut-off value, sensitivity and specificity of M/H ratio for thalassaemia trait discrimination was determined using Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analysis.
RESULTS: Subjects with thalassaemia trait showed higher MicroR compared to IDA ( p< 0.001) while subjects with IDA demonstrated higher Hypo-He than thalassaemia trait (p < 0.001). M/H ratio was significantly higher in thalassaemia trait compared to IDA, with medians of 3.77 (interquartile range: 2.57 - 6.52) and 1.73 (interquartile range: 1.27 - 2.38), respectively (p < 0.001). M/H ratio ≥ 2.25 was the optimal cut-off value for discriminating thalassaemia trait from IDA in hypochromic anaemia, with the area under ROC curve (AUC) of 0.83, sensitivity of 80.8% and specificity of 71.6%.
CONCLUSIONS: M/H ratio is a useful discriminant index to distinguish thalassaemia trait from IDA in hypochromic anaemia prior to diagnostic analysis for thalassaemia confirmation. High M/H ratio is suggestive of thalassaemia trait than of IDA. However, more studies are required to establish the role of M/H ratio as a screening tool for thalassaemia discrimination in hypochromic anaemia.
METHOD: Blood samples were obtained from 20 healthy blood donors, 30 RA patients who presented with anaemia and 30 patients who had pure iron deficiency anaemia (IDA). The samples were analysed for full blood count, iron, ferritin, transferrin, soluble transferrin receptor and prohepcidin.
RESULTS: The mean prohepcidin level in the control subjects was 256 microg/L. The prohepcidin level was significantly lower in IDA patients (100 microg/L; p < 0.0001) but not significantly different from that of control in RA patients (250 microg/L; p > 0.05). Higher serum soluble transferrin receptor (sTfR) levels were observed in IDA (p < 0.0001) but not in RA compared with that of control (p > 0.05). RA patients were divided into iron depleted and iron repleted subgroups based on the ferritin level. Prohepcidin in the iron depleted group was significantly lower than the iron repleted group and the control (p < 0.0001) and higher levels were observed in the iron repleted group (p < 0.01). sTfR levels in the iron depleted group were significantly higher than the control and the iron repleted patients (p < 0.001). In the iron repleted group, sTfR level was not statistically different from that of control (p > 0.05).
CONCLUSION: Serum prohepcidin is clearly reduced in uncomplicated iron deficiency anaemia. The reduced prohepcidin levels in the iron depleted RA patients suggests that there may be conflicting signals regulating hepcidin production in RA patients. In RA patients who have reduced hepcidin in the iron depleted group (ferritin <60 microg/L) where sTfR levels are increased suggests that these patients are iron deficient. Further studies with a larger cohort of patients are required to substantiate this point.