Evolution of the prevalence and characteristics of anemia in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases between 1993 and 2003
Unknown Author(s)
Abstract
<p><strong><em>Introduction : </em></strong><strong>Anemia has been considered as an overlooked </strong></p> <p><strong>complication of inflammatory bowel disease. Studies dating back </strong></p> <p><strong>to the 80ties and the 90ties have shown 30% of anemia among </strong></p> <p><strong>Inflammatory Bowel Disease patients. More recently, the broader </strong></p> <p><strong>use of immunosuppressive drug and infliximab allowing better </strong></p> <p><strong>mucosal healing as well as a more aggressive treatment of anemia, </strong></p> <p><strong>including the use of safer form of IV iron, may have influenced the </strong></p> <p><strong>prevalence of anemia among IBD patients. Our aim was to asses </strong></p> <p><strong>the prevalence and characteristics of anemia among two cohorts of </strong></p> <p><strong>IBD patients at 10 years interval and to look for associated clinical </strong></p> <p><strong>or demographic factors. </strong></p> <p><strong><em>Methods : </em></strong><strong>using the IBD patients register of one senior gas</strong></p> <p><strong>troenterologist, we identified IBD patients he had consecutively </strong></p> <p><strong>seen and who had blood test at the outpatient clinic during the </strong></p> <p><strong>years 1993 and 2003. Demographic and clinical characteristics, </strong></p> <p><strong>treatment for Crohn’s disease, blood test results and treatment of </strong></p> <p><strong>anemia were recorded and compared between these two cohorts. </strong></p> <p><strong>Anemia was defined as an hemoglobin level lower than the normal </strong></p> <p><strong>value of the laboratory of our hospital. </strong></p> <p><strong><em>Results : </em></strong><strong>80 and 90 patients were identified in 1993 and 2003, </strong></p> <p><strong>respectively. There was no significant difference between the two </strong></p> <p><strong>cohorts, according to age, gender, disease type, duration or loca</strong></p> <p><strong>tion. There were 27/80 (33.8%) and 15/90 (16.7%) anemic patients </strong></p> <p><strong>in 1993 and 2003, respectively (P = 0.013). The prevalence of severe </strong></p> <p><strong>anemia (hemoglobin level < 10.5 g/100 ml) was similar in the two </strong></p> <p><strong>cohorts (6.3% and 5.6%). Characteristics of the anemia were sim</strong></p> <p><strong>ilar in the two cohorts with a majority of iron deficiency anemia </strong></p> <p><strong>and inflammatory anemia. Ferritin and CRP levels were not sig</strong></p> <p><strong>nificantly different in the two cohorts. The only significant differ</strong></p> <p><strong>ence was a more frequent use of immunosuppressive treatment </strong></p> <p><strong>and infliximab in 2003 than in 1993 (33.3% vs. 13.8% ; P = 0.0038, </strong></p> <p><strong>RR : 0.41, 0.22-0.77) </strong></p> <p><strong><em>Conclusions : </em></strong><strong>Prevalence of mild to moderate anemia has sig</strong></p> <p><strong>nificantly decreased in our population over the last 10 years. The </strong></p> <p><strong>only difference detected between the two cohorts was the increased </strong></p> <p><strong>use of immunosuppressive drug (mainly azathioprine). </strong>(Acta</p> <p>gastroenterol. belg., <strong>2006</strong>, 69, <strong>1-4</strong>).</p>
